Essay #296 "Women and Jobs" 11.11.18

Despite the fact that in recent decades our world has become more open and women achieved social and political emancipation, there are still some prejudices which constrain their choice of work. This is a really important issue as this not only affects women in a highly negative way, but also creates conditions for further violations. Many people offer a very strict way to ensure equality, namely, by providing employees with certain quotas in order to maintain a certain ratio of employees of both sexes.

First of all, sex segregation, in spite of the fact that it still exists, is banned from many companies, which many employers do not appreciate. So, in many cases men and women have the same opportunities to get a certain position and hiring decisions are made only on the base of their knowledge and skills. Thus, inequality remains mostly in those professions which are culturally deemed as inclined to a certain gender.

Another point is that creating quotas for employees of a given sex will not only fail to solve this problem, but also create another one, where people will be segregated not on the basis of sex but for different reasons. That is why this approach is not the best option and people should concentrate on the creation of real equality, rather than making numbers and ratios look good. So, companies should follow more the spirit of equal opportunities, rather than formal numbers and statistics.

Finally, this “witch hunt” against prejudices can create a real tension in companies and give people chance to claim any dismissal of their CV as a violation of their rights. Therefore, this will put companies in a very difficult position and force them to keep even inefficient workers. People just have to understand that they have great number of opportunities and with effort they can achieve anything they want, in spite of their sex or sexual definition.

To conclude, sex segregation is the important issue of a modern age which should be solved. However, it cannot be resolved by plain quotas and hiring a particular number of people of the same sex. Companies should ensure not that they have employed equal numbers of men and women, but that they have given them equal opportunities and have judged them only on their professional skills.