SOCIAL ECONOMIC INEQUALITY FROM THE GENDER PERSPECTIVE: LITHUANIAN CASE Dr. Egle Krinickiene Mykolas Romeris University Head of Gender Studies Laboratory Vilnius, Lithuania ASEM Conference Women’s Economic Empowerment: Creating Equal Opportunities in the World of Work  25-26 May, 2017

Gender role stereotypes: - Boys – breadwinners and decision-makers; VICIOUS CIRCLE OF THE FORMATION OF SOCIAL ECONOMIC INEQUALITY BY GENDER (1) Gender inequality begins in the early childhood as learned / acquired behaviour in families. Gender role stereotypes: - Boys – breadwinners and decision-makers; - Girls – carers in households responsible for growing and aging generations and housework. Gender inequality has an impact on social economic inequality by gender and it is still a hardly changeable phenomena even in progressive societies of Europe and the world. This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

VICIOUS CIRCLE OF THE FORMATION OF SOCIAL ECONOMIC INEQUALITY BY GENDER (2) Stereotypically women and men choose different fields of study in secondary and tertiary education. The fields of study feed into their occupational choices, which in turn affect the wages they earn throughout their adult lives (World Bank, 2012). Women’s professions being more flexible at the same time are unattractive as less paid. Working part time is the source of incomparably less women’s income, in the long term – less old age pension, and bigger financial dependence from a partner. This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

Formation of uneven income creates gender pay gap, which: VICIOUS CIRCLE OF THE FORMATION OF SOCIAL ECONOMIC INEQUALITY BY GENDER (3) Formation of uneven income creates gender pay gap, which: serves as a background for social economic inequality between women and men; and is constantly maintained by vertical and horizontal segregation in the labour market. Women’s major role in the unpaid care economy is an important obstacle for their equal participation in the labour market. Finance and time are the main resources that women dispose to incomparably lesser extent than men. This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

VICIOUS CIRCLE OF THE FORMATION OF SOCIAL ECONOMIC INEQUALITY BY GENDER (4) "Addressing <...> inequities is not only a moral necessity, but would also have significant economic benefits both for families and for the economy more broadly. Implementing equal pay would mean an income increase for nearly 60 percent of U.S. women. Two-thirds of single mothers would get a raise of 17 percent (equal to more than $6,000 a year), and the poverty rate among these families would drop from 28,7 per cent to 15 per cent“ (Stiglitz, 2015). This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

GENDER ASPECT OF SOCIAL ECONOMIC INEQUALITY The gender aspect of social economic inequality becomes: firstly, an issue dealing with growing society polarization in terms of “richer men” and “poorer women”, secondly, with the need of fair distribution of results of economic growth between the two genders, and thirdly – with equal access to resources – both financial and time – for women and men. This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

MRU RESEARCH ON SOCIAL ECONOMIC INEQUALITY The group of scientists of Mykolas Romeris University, lead by prof. dr. habil. O. G. Rakauskiene, performed a research on social economic inequality, including the gender perspective. One of the purposes was to analyse society’s social economic inequality from a gender perspective and to explore the different positions of women and men in various fields (income, material deprivation, vulnerability and resilience and others). The research methodology was chosen as combination of theoretical and empirical methods. The method for empirical data collection was survey. This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

RESULTS OF SOCIOLOGICAL SURVEY (1) Lithuanian women dominate in the lowest income intervals while men are concentrated in the highest ones. Thus women face the threat of poverty and material deprivation more than men, which is proved by the official statistics. Income sources by gender revealed that more Lithuanian women than men live from the wage while more men have their income from own business and farming. This speaks about the sphere of private business as more open and friendly for men for it requires more financial and time resources. This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

RESULTS OF SOCIOLOGICAL SURVEY (2) Subjective evaluation of the respondents of financial shortage in the main spheres of population life such as material living, recreation, considerable purchase and vacation showed: - different possibilities of women and men (to women’s disadvantage) to afford themselves expenses; - considerably big social economic inequality amongst Lithuanian society. Women dominate in the lowest intervals of consumption expenditure but spend more on children’s education while men are more tend to make financial investment in order to increase the capital. This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

RESULTS OF SOCIOLOGICAL SURVEY (3) Women more often than men experience fear, worry and tension in considerable social economic spheres of life (payment for education, loosing the job, reluctant emigration, poverty etc.). Thus women are more vulnerable society group compared to men. This speaks about weaker resilience of women to combat life difficulties while men perceive this more naturally. This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

RESULTS OF SOCIOLOGICAL SURVEY (4) The different nurturing of a boy and a girl has a strong influence for ability to survive and succeed under the extremely competitive social and economic circumstances prevailing in labour market, business, research and other spheres. Equal possibilities for both genders could be created and strengthened by forming the resilience capabilities for both women and men. Raising gender competence at schools, universities and in the whole society could be one of the appropriate and effective tools. This research is funded by the Research Council of Lithuania (No. GER-009/2015)

Gender Studies Laboratory THANK YOU Gender Studies Laboratory Mykolas Romeris University Vilnius, Lithuania egle.krinickiene@gmail.com