Creating Gender Equality Through Unequal Legislation

UNIVERSIDAD FRANCISCO MARROQUIN

FACULTAD DE CIENCIAS ECONOMICAS

LAW AND ECONOMICS

CREATING GENDER EQUALITY

THROUGH UNEQUAL LEGISLATION

SOFIA SANCHEZ

2007 0248

25 DE MARZO DE 2010

CREATING GENDER EQUALITY

THROUGH UNEQUAL LEGISLATION

Throughout history women have had to fight for their legal and social rights including the right to educate themselves and having equal job opportunities. There used to be a social paradigm that a woman’s occupation was limited to being a housewife and a mother. However, in the past century, women have gained the right to freely express themselves, to vote, to have an education and work in different industries. The idea of women as the weaker sex is no longer a prominent idea and the number of laws that protect or benefit this gender is continually growing. Economists, politicians and even sociologists have been arguing if these laws have actually benefited women and if they are necessary for the progress of their role in society. In addition, there has been a serious dispute as to whether these laws are economically efficient and beneficial for the specific countries in which they are practiced.

Thus the purpose of this paper is to first, determine the existence of laws that benefit women directly. Secondly, to analyze the effects these laws have in the development of women in a society and finally, to determine and analyze the effects these laws have in the economy and progress of a society.

Current Legal Frame

The legal and economic development of the world has allowed women to legally have the same rights as men. Women are treated as equals having freedom of speech and religion, property rights, the right to vote, work in a private or public enterprise and even to earn a just and equal salary. In most developed countries women went from being treated as second-class citizens to having the same political, social and economic rights as men. Laws that would seem impossible and ridiculous five hundred years...