Workplace gender inequality in Mongolia

Introduction

In 2016, Mongolia is ranked 58 out of 144 nations with an index of 0.705 by Gender Gap Report of World Economic Forum. This is one of the best indicators in the region but, the gender research of national statistics and current studies show that the effects of political and economic transition have been influencing distinctive for men and women. According to Thomas (2005), during this transition, numerous households were suffered in poverty with lack of employment due to economic and political instability, and social services were extremely diminished. This cycle of transformation has created gender gaps in various areas of social change, in Mongolia.

This developing country with 3 million people has been struggling to tackle gender issues since 1990-democratic transition. According to Khan and Aslam (2013), in previous few years, Mongolia has paid strong attention to main gender related Millennium Development Goals. For instance, in 2008,two essential focuses for child mortality and maternal health were met. Health and education’s gender indexes are preferred over the most of nations in the East Asia and Pacific area (Gender Gap Report, 2016). However, in the circumstance of workplace or labour markets, gender inequality is still prevalent; women are paid less than men with limited opportunities to advance their careers, and with high levels of occupational segregation.

This essay will assume workplace gender inequality in Mongolia, as one of areas of social change. Specifically, the paper will assume the current context of gender gap in workplace, in a case study country, through statistics, sexual harassment in workplace, wage disparity between men and woman, law, and young Mongolian men’s perspective, and will analyse what is the relation between chosen area of social change and others processes.

Gender in workplace

Mongolia’s population is young. Nearly 46 percent of the men and 44 percent of the women working age populace are more youthful than 30 years old (Table 1). Moreover, economic and political changes started in the 1990s have created migration from rural areas to urban areas and the Ulaanbaatar-capital city, with presently labour force’s 40 percent living in capital city (Mongolian Labour Force Survey, 2009). World Development Indicators (2010) shows that 66 percent of working age population work in the informal sector[1], such as agriculture. According to Khan and Aslam (2013), while men are situated in secondary area, numerous women are gathered in the tertiary area, in the informal or the formal sector.

Table 1: Participation of labour force by gender and location (Mongolian Labour Force Survey, 2009)

Women’s contribution in economic action is comparatively good. Though, although proportion of male working population is increasing, the proportion of women is decreasing due to effects of financial stagnation from 2014 to 2016, in Mongolia. Begzsuren and Aldar (2013) take the view that the Labour law’s articles to secure women do not generally work decidedly for the employment of women, yet can prevent women from increasing gender disparities of wage and accessing to work. For instance, women’s incomes are effected by early retirement, the reason is that if the woman loses her job,it can reduce to zero in the worst situation.Female working population spend generally double the amount of time than men oncare and household obligations, and the problem is that this spending time does not decrease when women participated in paid profitable job in the economic activity. This demonstrates that employed women are required to participate in a twice loading. In Mongolia, women are more employed in sectors that are commonly funded by state budgets and provided with low wages, such as health care, social services and education.

· Law and legislations

Mongolian mother legislation is “Constitution of Mongolia (1992)”. Gender equality is fundamentally provided by this legislation. Article 16 of the Constitution states that “Women and men have equal rights in the social, political, cultural, economic life and family relations”. Also in the Article 14, it is stipulated that “Everyone should be free from any types of discrimination based on her or his social status, race, ethnicity, sex, language, age, religious belief, viewpoints, employment, education level and wealth”.Khan and Aslam (2013) claim that this central Asian country is a signatory to almost all general international conventions, which related to gender equality, and passed a “Law on Promotion of Gender Equality” in February 2011 as well. This law particularly guarantees gender equality in legal, cultural, political, social and family relations. In addition, it addresses the obligations of public organizations such as the office of the Prime Minister, as to guarding against discrimination, suggests assenting action strategies in public area, and builds up a complaint mechanism through the employment dispute commissions and the National Human Rights Commission (Begzsuren and Aldar, 2013). Despite of these main legislations, there is other significant laws, for example (table 2):

· Sexual harassment in the workplace

Bayarmaa and Ayurbuni (2009) claims thatthe mass in Mongolia does not perceive that in spite of the fact that sexual harassment may appear to be a private concern, it is honestly a social matter.Mongolia’s public understanding of this emerging concern is really low. The latest study on sexual harassment in the workplace by Mongolian Women’s Fund (2010) view that 86.3% of respondents received an occurrence of workplace sexual harassment. Also the study found thatsexual harassment is generally dedicated by higher- positioning authorities, teachers and managers in the employment sphere. Accusers of sexual harassment in the workplace noiselessly hurt accordingly of many components, with apprehension of losing their employment and having their reputation harmed. Globally, high risk of sexual harassment exists in the sectors such as the army, education, roads, police and construction (Begzsuren& Aldar, 2013). Mongolia has a similar hazard as well.Begzsuren and Aldar (2013) concluded that in the education sector, the most of female students had faced sexual harassment at university. Bayarmaa and Ayurburni suggested that a course on violence against females in the curricula of the secondary school and using mass media to sensitise the mass.

· Wage disparity between men and women

There is a wage gap between women and men due to particular reasons. Morgan (2005) shows that women’s subject choices and education are related with their lower career purposes and they may ‘self -select’ into the jobs with low salary. Women may even increase a wage disparity over their careers because of lack of working experience due to child birth breaks in their careers. Hence, theymay get paid not as much as men due to women show lower profitability qualities (specialisation, training or experience amongst others) to the workforce market (Morgan, 2005). According to Khan and Aslam (2013), In Mongolian context, expansive and expanding wage disparities exist in almost all economy sectors that women are participated in, the major exceptions are public administration, retail trade and wholesale.

Table 3: Employment by sector and percent of total

Generally, women gain nearly 10 percent less than men and the disparity is even clear over all education levels and in the formal sector and it is mostly high in bigger cities.According to the National Statistical Office of Mongolia (2016), the national average earning for men was 13.3 percent higher than women. The World Bank (2009) concludes that initially, in Mongolia’s labour market, there are “considerable contrasts in treatment of men and women by companies”; and second, the explanations behind this disparity are strongly dependent on discrimination instead of skills and qualities. Furthermore, the sectors with high wage gap are machinery and equipment operations (women’s average earning was 48% lower than men); agriculture and fishery (men’s average earning is 36 percent higher than women) NSO, ILO, and MPDSP, 2012).In the same type of job, women specialists gain 15.5 percent lower earnings than men, and there is a 14 percent disparity for male managers and lawyers employed in NGOs and government. According to the Graduate Follow-Up Survey by MCA-Mongolia (2011), the men’s average monthly salaries were approximately 1,255,798 MNT (nearly 900 AU$) compared with 680,667 MNT (nearly 500 AU$) for women.

· Men’s perspective

There is another interesting perspective by men. A German journalist Stephan Scheuer interviewed Gantulga- Mongolian 34-year-old man. While he is doing business with his own vehicle as a taxi driver, Gantulga’s wife is the financial director of a hotel and is gaining more money than him. According to Scheuer (2013), hecomplaints that “it is not fair, in any case”. Obviously, females’ liberation is vital, however the circumstance has become hard for the men in the meantime. A change is required, through equivalent gender openings- with the males getting an assistance. For the young men in Mongolia, his circumstance is common. The reason is that the women are dominate in higher education, with statistics showing their proportion at over 70 percent of university alumni. It is based on the parents’ view that sending their girls to the colleges and universities is more significant than boys. Also, they consider that boys can get a job without a higher education degree. This states of mind have meanwhile started to change, yet finding good job is now a main issue for one generation of Mongolian men (Scheuer, 2013). Robinson (2010) states that in today’s Mongolia, women have progressed much further. The young men were told to tend to the animals at home, while the girls got the advanced education.

Gantulga says while he taking some deep breaths that “I think this is not so right”. For that time, he is fine with his wife having more earnings than his incomes, yet he wants some changes in the future (Scheuer, 2013).

AmarsaikhanGantulga even guards his friends whose wives are breadwinner. “I cook almost everyday, and I happily do it,” he states, trusting he can weather the dry stretch until he works with high wage. Also, he can be stayed at home for his son and believes that his son should definitely gain more than his wife does in the future.”

Conclusion

Passing a “Law on Promotion of Gender Equality” was a significant success for Mongolia. It is provided lack of gender law and supports to past achievements of Mongolia in meeting main gendered Millennium Development Goals. Women in Mongolia are well educated than other women in the region, and contrasted with Mongolian men as well (Begzsuren& Aldar, 2013). Although this country has been struggling to tackle gender inequality issues, there are substantial disparity between women and men in workplace, in terms of earnings, occupational roles and participation. Also, women have a restricted participation in entrepreneurial and in administrative positions, and employed females bear almost all of the household and care obligations contrasted with men.

These gender disparities impact on the development and progress of the economy. According to the World Bank World Development Report (2012), tackling issues of gender disparities in workplace, eliminating discrimination and providing equal access to economic opportunities can support profitability for firms, more extensive returns for the economy. In Mongolian context, policy action is required to increase women’s labour market outcomes, and to provide equal participation in the economy.

Consequently, the cases and statistics in this essay demonstrate that gender inequality in workplace is not only about labour market or employment. It deeply relates to other areas of social change such as education, health, law, social norm, political transition, economic stagnation and so on.

Reference list

Begzsuren, Ts.,& Aldar, D. (2013). Gender Overview-Mongolia, Desk Study. Independent Research

Japan International Cooperation Agency. (2013). Country Gender Profile: Mongolia. Final Report. Retrieved from: http://www.gwweb.jica.go.jp/km/FSubject1501.nsf/cfe2928f2c56e150492571c7002a982c/74875bed7d20467349257b010026a259/$FILE/ATTTW2R1.pdf

Morgan, M. (2005). Country Gender Assessment. Asian Development Bank. Retrieved from: http://www.adb.org/sites/default/files/institutional-document/32236/cga-mongolia.pdf

NSO (2008), National Statistical Office Yearbook, Mongolia Statistical Office

Pastore, F. (2010). The Gender Gap in Early Career in Mongolia, International Journal of Manpower, Vol.31, No 2, pp. 188–207

Pastore, F. (2008), ‘School-to-work Transitions in Mongolia’, ILO Employment Sector, Employment Sector working paper №14.

Scheuer, S. (2013). “Women are favoured more by the bosses. They are considered to be more adaptable,” says Gantulga. Gulf times. Retrieved from: http://www.gulf-times.com/story/363932/In-Mongolia-men-are-demanding-gender-equality

The World Bank. (2017). World Development Indicators. Retrieved from: http://www.data.worldbank.org/data-catalog/world-development-indicators

World Economic Forum. (2016). Global Gender Gap Report. Retrieved from: http://reports.weforum.org/global-gender-gap-report-2016

[1]Informal work includes unpaid workforces and own account workforces in informal sectors.