When women can put their unique talents and skills to work in the world for themselves and others, everyone benefits. We envision a world where women earn equitably and have the power to control the gains of their hard work; where women are represented equally across industries and leadership roles; and where women have the agency and safety to make choices about their economic future. Then we will have a world where women, girls, boys and men all thrive.

Just like with sexual reproductive health and rights, women’s economic empowerment doesn’t just benefit women - it benefits everyone! For example:

• Stronger Economies. Women’s economic empowerment boosts productivity, increases economic diversification, and improves income equality.  
• Stronger Companies. Increasing employment and leadership opportunities for women is shown to increase organizational effectiveness and growth.
• Stronger Families. There are strong, positive links between women’s economic empowerment and health outcomes for women and their families, including beneficial effects on maternal and child mortality.

In the United States

We are in the midst of a tremendous shift in wealth in the United States. By the end of the decade, it is estimated that women will hold two-thirds of the wealth in our country, due largely to demographic shifts.

But this datapoint belies the fact that many millions of women in the U.S. are not thriving economically. And that on many fronts, progress has been entirely too slow and unequal across race and class. Persistent pay gaps, occupational segregation, and a disproportionate burden of unpaid labor are some of key reasons that gender economic equality in the U.S. remains a distant goal.  

• Pay Gap. One of the most persistent inequities is the pay gap. White women currently earn 79 cents for every dollar earned by a man, Black women earn only 63 cents on the dollar, and for Latinas it is a dismal 58 cents.  
• Occupational Segregation. Women have less access to traditionally male fields even today. Industries that have been historically open to women, and where they continue to fill the vast majority of positions (e.g., teaching, caregiving), pay less. This is particularly the case for industries dominated by women of color.
• Unpaid Labor, like household work and caregiving for children or elders, is a shared societal responsibility, but women do a disproportionate amount of it. Women spend almost two hours more per day than men doing unpaid labor, and COVID exacerbated this. Not to mention the U.S is one of only two countries that has no paid family leave.

In the Global South

Around the world, women entrepreneurs have become an important and growing market force, spurring innovation, creating jobs and fueling economic growth. They are also key actors in the fields feeding the world – in lower income countries, women make up 43% of the agricultural workforce.  

Yet barriers and discrimination impede women’s economic empowerment at nearly every turn. Many of these are similar to the U.S. – women are paid less, do more unpaid labor, and face discrimination in achieving leadership roles.  Additionally,  in many economies in Africa, Asia and Latin America, women face legal barriers to their economic freedom. Globally, over 2.7 billion women are legally restricted from having the same choice of jobs as men. Women farmers have unequal land and property rights in many countries, meaning the right to the very asset from which they make their living is insecure. Women are also more likely than men to work in the informal economy, leaving them without the protection of labor laws and social benefits, while working for lower wages and in less safe conditions.

Women also face more disadvantages in starting a business. In 40% of countries, women’s early stage entrepreneurship is half that of men’s. Women-owned businesses do not have equal access to capital, markets, market information, digital services, and other resources that create a thriving business. 

There is a wide array of investment worthy work in the space of women’s economic empowerment!  We are interested in work that focuses around better legal and regulatory frameworks, policies, practices, and social norms that will enable progress toward economic empowerment for women, as well as increasing access to opportunity for women entrepreneurs.

As before, this will look different in different places and those closest to the issues should be identifying the priorities, developing the strategies, and leading the work.

Feminist Movements.  Here again, feminist movements are an effective force in achieving progress to create economic empowerment for women, particularly when pushing for systemic changes, such as policy change, holding government and corporations to account, and shifting the narrative around key issues. These movements also recognize that women’s experiences are deeply interconnected, and look at economic empowerment in the context of barriers like gender-based violence, conflict, environmental degradation, and climate change. 

Entrepreneurship & Access to Capital. Women leaders need more resourcing of their great ideas, businesses and livelihoods. We are interested in organizations that provide training, coaching and mentorship to expand the leadership and management capacity of women entrepreneurs to scale resilient businesses; create networking opportunities and build peer communities; and offer access to appropriate capital and financial services.  We recognize for rural women whose business is agriculture that supporting their entrepreneurship may include expanding their access to and ownership of land.

* * Grateful recognition to the Gates Foundation and UN Women from whom we drew inspiration in the definition of women’s economic empowerment in this brief.