The Economic Cost of Gender-Based Discrimination in Social Institutions

Back to: Gender, School and Society- Unit 1

In educational institutions, equality is often related to access and outcomes. Equality ensures that every student has equal access to a high-quality education regardless of their social background. It also ensures that all students are accountable to the same standards and objectives without taking into account their circumstances, abilities, or experiences. Inequality on the grounds of gender is pretty common in educational institutes even in today’s age. Male teachers may be more partial toward female learners while some female teachers may be more partial toward male learners.

The economic cost of gender-based discrimination in social institutions is as follows:

Pay Gap

In many professional fields, there is a huge pay gap between men and women. Even when they may be doing the same work, men get paid more. This can cause frustration among women and for a long time, there has been a demand for equal pay.

Promotion

In their work field, men are the more popular choice when it comes to promotions than women. This leads women to not get paid for their worth and to ensure equality the government must develop facilities that can offer equal treatment to individuals of all genders.

More Funds

Since gender discrimination exists everywhere, the government has to invest more funds in giving equal access to opportunities to all genders to ensure that the fundamental rights of every individual can be secured.

Global Loss of Wealth

The unequal pay can lead women to have a poor financial status as compared to men and this is a global loss of wealth. When they do not receive the pay they deserve to receive, the government has to put in more effort to offer them incentives and this increases the global amount of investment incurred.

Financial Investment in Schemes and Programmes

From education to career opportunities, the government needs to ensure that every individual has a secure future. Gender discrimination can lead to unequal access to the same and to prevent this, the government has to organize various schemes and programs which may require the investment of a huge amount of financial resources.

Gender is one of the most common ways of organizing the social life of human beings. Parents assume boys and girls to be different ever since infancy. In the 1970s, the feminists viewed can the notion of gender as a ‘construct’. Hence, Gender can be regarded as a socially constructed concept used to differentiate men and women and assign them different roles and responsibilities, and so on. Social construction refers to the knowledge created and assumed by social institutions rather than possessing any inherent truth on their own.

From toys to activities, levels of boisterousness to language, television programs to reading material, everything is selected carefully and monitored by the individuals according to their gender. The media reinforces these ideas and agenda through its portrayal of women as attractive and glamorous and while men are portrayed as individuals who are successful and powerful.