EU: Women's employment must increase three times faster to meet targets

The report also found that sectors of the economy that are likely to decline in the future are currently dominated by men

Eurofound said there has been little change in the gender employment gap at around 12 percentage points since 2014.

Women’s employment will have to increase at a rate at least three times faster than that of men until the end of the decade in order to meet EU targets, the European Commission has said.     

The new report by the European Commission and Eurofound — the agency responsible for improving living and working conditions across EU states — said the EU targets include an employment rate of 78% and a halving of the gender employment gap. 

But Eurofound said meeting the targets "is a significant challenge" because there has been little change in the gender employment gap at around 12 percentage points since 2014.

"The large increase in female employment has been a distinctive feature of labour market change in Europe over the last two decades, with two out of three net new jobs in the EU being taken up by women," the agency said. 

📈 New research from Eurofound and @EU_ScienceHub shows that women’s employment will have to increase at a rate at least three times faster than that of men until the end of the decade in order to meet EU targets.

📰 News release: https://t.co/a9VzBTNcMR pic.twitter.com/a2f8DmsRr3

— Eurofound (@eurofound) December 14, 2021

"However, the research identifies a number of trends in this labour market change, particularly in relation to labour market segregation: Women’s increased employment has been seen largely in jobs where women already predominated, with this segregation notably increasing in central and eastern member states over the past 20 years – albeit from a lower comparative base level than other member states," it said. 

One reason the gender employment gap could be closed, however, is that the industries where women dominate are set to expand in the coming years.

Sectors of the economy that are likely to decline in the future are currently dominated by men.        

"Women have also benefited more than men from employment growth in well-paid jobs: Three predominantly state-funded sectors – public administration, health and education – account for a majority of recent employment growth in well-paid jobs among women," Eurofound said.