ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times

DATE: Sunday, September 29, 1996             TAG: 9609270010
SECTION: BUSINESS                 PAGE: 2    EDITION: METRO 
COLUMN: Workplace
DATELINE: CHICAGO
SOURCE: CAROL KLEIMAN CHICAGO TRIBUNE

NUMBER OF WOMEN WORKING INCREASES BUT SALARIES AREN'T

The International Labour Organization reports that women worldwide have made ``significant gains in entering formerly male-dominated jobs.''

But, the ILO also reports that ``while more women are working, the great majority of them simply are swelling the ranks of the working poor.''

According to the ILO, more than 45 percent of women worldwide ages 15 to 65 are in paid employment. In industrialized countries, more than half of all women work outside the home.

In fact, in the 28 countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, whose members include the United States, Canada, Japan and Western European nations, the number of employed women grew by a rate more than twice the rate for men from 1980 to 1990.

``Women's economic activities remain highly concentrated in low-wage, low-productivity and precarious forms of employment,'' said Lin Lean Lim of Malaysia, author of the ILO report, ``More and Better Jobs for Women: An Action Guide.''

Employment discrimination U.S. women face is universal:

* The majority of women earn only 75 percent of what men make for the same work (excluding agricultural jobs).

* The unemployment rate for women is 50 to 100 percent higher than for men in many industrialized countries.

* Women have fewer than 6 percent of management jobs in the global labor force.

Although some women are making gains, such as joining trade unions worldwide and moving into management and administrative jobs in Latin America and the Caribbean, Michel Hansenne, ILO director-general, says, ``Equality of opportunity and treatment for women in employment has yet to be achieved anywhere in the world.''

Discrimination starts early for women, with a lack of education: Women make up 65 percent of the world's illiterate.

In Benin, Burkina Faso, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Senegal, Togo, Afghanistan and Nepal, more than 90 percent of the women who are 25 and older have never been to school.

And many of the women who do get jobs are zapped again by inequality of pay.

Some of this is because of occupational segregation, the report says. ``Not only do men and women have different occupations, men do the work of higher pay and status,'' Lim said.

As an example, she noted that most of the world's school administrators and doctors are men while most teachers and nurses are women.

Although equal pay for equal work is a good start toward economic equity for women, the ILO suggests it is not enough: All women in gender-segregated jobs get the same low wages.

That's why ILO suggests worldwide implementation of equal pay for work of equal value, a compensation concept that ignores gender but takes into account the skills and education needed.

``It acknowledges that women and men often perform different work and recognizes that this segregation easily can lead to wage discrimination,'' Lim said.

To achieve fair pay, some Canadian provinces use job descriptions as a means of determining salary. And, in 1983, France amended its law on non-discrimination in wages to include training and experience, responsibility, physical and mental requirements and work conditions in determining salaries.

``Enforcing the principle of `comparable worth' by providing equal pay for work of equal value is necessary to eliminate male-female wage differences within industries and to reduce the large differences between `female' and `male' jobs in the highly gender-segregated world of work,'' the report concludes.

``If the money from women's unpaid work and from women not being paid equally for the worth of the job they do were counted, it would add $16 trillion annually to the world economy,'' said Kelly Jenkins, program coordinator of the National Committee On Pay Equity in Washington. ``Being paid fairly is critical to women's rights. If you don't have economic independence, you're not free.''

And U.S. women should be concerned for women in other countries. ``If transnational corporations can get away with paying women less in a foreign country, then they will take their jobs from the U.S. and exploit women overseas,'' Jenkins said.

LENGTH: Medium:   83 lines