Why should you care that women have 25% less participation in the labour force compared to men in Malaysia?
According to the Global Gender Gap Report 2020 by the World Economic Forum, the gender gap for economic participation will take a staggering 257 years to close compared to 202 years in the 2019 report. Malaysia ranks a lowly 104 out of 153 countries in the report.
According to the Malaysia’s Labour Force Survey Report in 2019, female labour force participate rate (LFPR) in Malaysia is at 55.6% compared to 80.8% of men’s participation rate (DOSM, 2019). This number shows that approximately 5 out of 10 women are employed or seeking employement whilst the balance are not actively seeking work. It is important to note that this group does not include retirees and students. Comparing to several countries within the region, such as Japan, China, Thailand, Cambodia, Singapore and Vietnam — Malaysia ranks the lowest in female LFPR (see Figure 1). Although there has been slight improvements over the decade of female LFPR in Malaysia, attention needs to be paid to this issue.
So, why does this matter and why should we care?
1. Because it is a moral issue
Women are compelled to make decisions that men may not need to consider because of social norms and gender-specific factors. These constraints include their endowments, household and family-related factors which then influence women to possibly forfeit or not consider an employment or business opportunity (Profit Parity, n.d.). The risk of gender-based violence (GBV) also hinders a woman to go to work — for fear of physical or emotional violence either by members of their family or their potential employer. According to Jane Lattimore, a market research professional in Malaysia, her research shows the main factor leading to a female Malaysian not entering the workforce is due to the fear of sexual harrassment.
2. Women have been invisible for far too long
According to an African case study, when men were encouraged to move away from home to work in industrial areas, it was the women who stayed back and took over working in the farm. Men were also enticed to sell their land for cash but in turn women till a smaller plow of land to generate food for the home (Simmons, 1997). I suspect this could be the same for Malaysia and women have been far too long working behind the scenes without being acknowledged. The issue with this, however, is that by proposing more jobs for women just to make them ‘visible’ may be a mere form of tokenism. Simmons (1997) argues that creating a system for women that was made for the West and men in general “relegates other cultures to being traditional” (p. 248) and that the “value of other forms of knowledge” is ridiculed (p. 252).
3. Because advancing gender equality is smart economics
If women’s participation in Malaysia matches the best in the region by 2025, the GDP of the nation would grow by 10% which amounts to $USD1,826 per person (McKinsey Global Institute, n.d.). McKinsey Global Institute also predicts that if women participate in the labor force at the same rate as men, work the same number of hours as men, and are employed at the same levels as men across sectors — East and Southeast Asia would see a growth of $3.3 trillion in GDP, out of which $200 billion will come from Malaysia.
According to these data and prediction, hiring women or having women leaders in businesses makes economic sense. Females do move the economic needle of a nation.
Most efforts and programs today focuses on women’s empowerment rights, women’s economic empowerment, access to schools for women but these can seem trivial and simplistic indicators created by men or hierarchical structures (Wallace, 2020). These programs and numbers do not tell the quality of education or job, or that the number of women who had to stay home after receiving education due to social norms.
Whilst these are good indicators to begin with, they do not address power and inequality. Gender inequality needs to be reimagined and have the women lead, engage and define their own equation of success.
References:
Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM). (2019). https://www.dosm.gov.my/v1/index.php?r=column/cthemeByCat&cat=126&bul_id=TlVMbEtBVXBGTi80VjdqZ1JUdVRHdz09&menu_id=Tm8zcnRjdVRNWWlpWjRlbmtlaDk1UT09
MyKinsey Global Institute (n.d.). https://www.cfr.org/womens-participation-in-global-economy/
Simmons, P. (1997). Women in development: A threat to liberation. In The post development reader (pp. 244–254). Zed Books.
Wallace, T. (2020). Re-imagining development by (re)claiming feminist visions of development alternatives. Gender& Development, 28(1), 31–49. https://doi.org/10.1080/13552074.2020.1724698
World Bank Group. (n.d.). Profiting from parity: Unlocking the potential of women’s businesses in Africa.
