Women, Business and the Law 2016: Getting to Equal

This edition of Women, Business and the Law highlights the World Bank Group’s commitment to generating objective data and building knowledge about gender equality. The report draws on readily comparable data across seven indicators: accessing institutions, using property, getting a job, providing incentives to work, building credit, going to court and protecting women from violence. It expands data coverage to 30 more economies than the previous edition in order to enhance global understanding of laws that affect women’s economic opportunities.

The data reveal the magnitude of the challenge that the world still faces in the quest for gender equality. It seems clear from the evidence that while governments are working progressively to provide equality of opportunity for women, there are still laws that differentiate between women and men in ways that affect women’s economic prospects: of the 173 economies covered, 155 have at least one law that differentiates between women and men. These inequalities impede development, hinder prosperity and undermine national competitiveness.