The director of the National Institute for Women, Mónica Bottero, reported on March 8 that unemployment for women fell 1.7 percentage points, compared to the 2019 data, which increased access to social security by 4% and the income gap between men and women narrowed. “There is a cultural change,” she said, Bottero.
The activity, held in the Executive Tower, was attended by the President of the Republic Luis Lacalle Pou, the acting Vice President, Graciela Bianchi; the Secretary of the Presidency, Álvaro Delgado; the heads of the Ministries of Social Development (Mides), Martin Lema; Foreign Relations, Francisco Bustillo; Labor and Social Security, Pablo Mieres; Interior, Luis Alberto Heber; Education and Culture, Pablo da Silveira, and Environment, Robert Bouvier.
Also present were the interim Minister of Tourism, Remo Monzeglio; the president of the Central Bank of Uruguay, Diego Labat, and the director of the Mides Care Secretariat, Florencia Krall, among other national and departmental authorities.
Bottero indicated that the slogan for this March 8 is “We are worth the same. We have the same rights. We need the same opportunities ”and that it is a day of awareness to promote the economic autonomy of women, which he cataloged as a central knot in gender inequality.
“We can say that some gender gaps have been reduced in this period of government,” he said.
In this sense, he explained that unemployment for women fell 1.7 percentage points compared to the 2019 data. That year, they presented unemployment of 10.7%, while for men it was 7.6%. As for the figures for 2022, unemployment stood at 9% and 6.9%, respectively. This implies a reduction of 1.3 percentage points.
Regarding access to employment, he mentioned that employed women in 2022 were 49.7% of the total. This indicator increased by more than half a percentage point compared to 2019 levels, when it stood at 49.1%. He noted that, prior to the pandemic, there were 734,800 employed women and that there are currently 743,200.
The hierarch pointed out that women earn 78.4 pesos for every 100 that men receive and assessed that the difference has decreased by about 2 percentage points since 2019, when the relationship was 76.3 pesos for every 100. “It shows a trend.” Bottero said.
Regarding social security, he said that in 2022 informality was lower if compared to the figure prior to 2020; it stood at 19.4%, while in 2019 it was 23.4%. “We have 4% more formalized women,” stressed the hierarch, who noted that this population works, between paid and unpaid work, 54.2 hours per week, and men, 49.9.
“Women recovered two hours of paid work and lowered the hours of unpaid work. There is a cultural change and a greater awareness of what is called gender co-responsibility ”, she emphasized.
Minister Mieres highlighted that the recovery of employment began for women in the midst of a health emergency due to covid-19, since the State took concrete actions, and that gender gaps continue to narrow.
“Uruguay is more advanced than many countries and the data demonstrates this,” the chief remarked.
Labat, meanwhile, announced that there are two projects to cooperate with Inmujeres. The purpose of the first is to help measure unpaid work and the second is an agreement for financial education programs to be included in those of the institution directed by Mónica Bottero.
