Our country, compared to 2011, has lost six positions in the ranking relating to gender inequalities, placing itself in eightieth place out of 135 countries examined.
Promoting the presence of women in the labor market is not just a question of fairness, but of growth: an investment in the future of all of us.
Personally, having lived a professional career in the male-dominated IT industry as a woman, I can say for sure that it hasn't been easy. Just as it is not easy in general for women to enter the world of work and aspire to managerial roles. And, in a context like the current one, both women and young people are penalized more.
The growth of women in top positions is, both in economics and in politics, the bearer of the cultural change necessary to advance the country, even more ours, bringing up the rear in all international rankings.
Recent research by Goldman Sachs has shown that world GDP would be 13% higher if gender parity in the world of work were truly achieved; there would be more income and spending capacity by activating a welfare multiplier in old Europe as well.
It has also been shown that gender balance is correlated with better company performance. What opportunities are Italian companies that have such a low representation of women at the top missing out? With women becoming the majority of the workforce in countries like Canada and the United States and already being the majority of college graduates in several countries around the world.
An active participation and a high representation of women in both the public and private sectors is necessary, naturally for merits in the field. The fact is that it is not enough to create support for female employment: it is also necessary to create the conditions whereby women can remain in the labor market.
Companies must reward merit and not evaluate gender. The selection of deserving personnel cannot be based on gender. In human beings we need to appreciate skills, commitment, determination and merit. In recent years, women have started very different training courses, adapting to the needs of companies. The fact that they have abandoned more traditional studies to get in line with the needs of companies is certainly the keystone. And not only are there more female graduates than men, but the good graduates are always more girls.
Women need economic and labor policies that stop discriminating against them, directly or indirectly with precarious and underpaid jobs.
Politics has an essential role in this context and I hope that the new government, focusing on renewal, will be able to implement the project of making Italy a modern, dynamic and just country
In Italy then the problem concerns meritocracy in general. A wider category than women, the young, suffers from the lack of appreciation of merit. More than on women's work, we should focus on the dangerous and dramatic situation that the new generations are facing. We women are first of all mothers of children who are struggling to enter the world of work. I believe that today we must all commit ourselves to promoting the inclusion of young men and women in the labor market.
Merit is the most democratic tool there is and the only one that must be adopted. This is the real challenge facing Italy today.
