Understanding Economic Disparities

If we treated this like any other economic shock, we’d call it what it is: a structural failure. In my latest Fortune byline, I break down why the U.S. labor market is diverging along lines of race, gender, and pay: 🔹 Black women down 297,000 jobs since February 🔹 Men up +621,000 jobs 🔹 673,000 women still missing from the workforce since the pandemic 🔹 Job growth concentrated in the lowest-paying sectors for women 🔹 Pay gaps widening (again) This is not happening by accident. It’s happening by design. When the most educated female cohort in the country is pushed out of stable, high-wage sectors, and concentrated in the lowest-paying ones, that is a policy choice. When we continue to count only who is in the labor market, and ignore who has been pushed out, that is a modeling failure. And when we treat women’s economic participation as optional rather than foundational, that is a national risk. The Exit Economy is what emerges when exclusion becomes the operating system. It doesn’t just cost women. It costs the entire country. #GenderEconomist #LaborMarket #EconomicEquity #WomenAndTheEconomy #BlackWomenAtWork #IntersectionalEconomics #JobsReport #EconomicData #FutureOfWork #EquityAsEconomicStrategy Nick Lichtenberg Emma Hinchliffe Jessica Sibley AJ Hess Ray Vanessa Mobley Rachel Wolfe

You know it. I know it. Return to office isn't neutral. It disproportionately impacts women, especially mothers and caregivers. I was honored to share my thoughts with Taylor Telford for her latest The Washington Post piece exploring how aggressive RTO policies are pushing women's progress backwards. (Link in comments) As I shared in this piece, it is not a "choice" when the options are so limited. Women are once again finding themselves pushed out of the paid workforce. Some key takeaways from the article: 👉 After decades of gradual progress, the gender wage gap is widening again. In 2024, women earned just 80.9 cents for every dollar earned by men, dropping from 84 cents in 2022. 👉 For many women, especially those with caregiving responsibilities, rigid office policies are forcing "choices": accept demotions, take pay cuts, or leave entirely. 👉 Turnover among women at companies with strict in-office mandates is nearly THREE TIMES that of men. 👉 The lack of affordable, accessible childcare continues to widen the pay gap. 👉 Policies like RTO and limiting flexibility are stagnating women who feel forced to step off the ladder towards career growth to manage caregiving. This is exactly why at WRK/360, our mission is to help workplaces ACTUALLY be family and caregiving friendly. Not just in rhetoric, but in policy, culture, and practice. The dynamics the article highlights aren’t hypothetical; they are the exact challenges we work with our clients on daily. ✔️ We help companies design policies (e.g., hybrid, flexible schedules, core hours) that allow for collaboration without penalizing caregivers ✔️We coach leadership on equitable performance criteria so that remote or hybrid contributors are not implicitly devalued ✔️We partner with organizations to embed family-supportive programs that retain talent. HR and leadership teams: 👉 Still considering an RTO mandate? Think about what this really means for women and caregivers. 👉 Already have one in place? Run an audit on your turnover. How has this policy impacted men vs. women? Caregivers vs. non-caregivers? What talent are you losing? Together, we can protect the progress made over decades and stop pushing women and caregivers out of the paid workforce.

We often talk about the power of land ownership in creating generational wealth. But when we look at two key 19th-century land policies—“40 Acres and a Mule” and the Homestead Act of 1862—we see a stark difference in how opportunity was distributed. The Homestead Act was a landmark policy that granted millions of acres of public land to settlers—mostly white Americans—who agreed to farm it. Over 270 million acres were distributed, providing a foundation for generational wealth that still benefits families today. The descendants of those homesteaders inherited land, assets, and financial stability that fueled upward mobility. On the other hand, 40 Acres and a Mule—a promise made to formerly enslaved African Americans after the Civil War—was never fulfilled. General Sherman’s Special Field Order No. 15 offered newly freed people land to build a future. But within months, the order was overturned, and the land was returned to former Confederate owners. Without access to land ownership, Black Americans were pushed into cycles of sharecropping, tenant farming, and systemic economic exclusion. The result? The Homestead Act helped create an economic foundation for millions of white families, while the failure to provide 40 Acres and a Mule denied African Americans a similar start. This racial wealth gap didn’t happen by accident—it was a direct result of policies that either provided or withheld opportunity. As we reflect during Black History Month, it’s important to recognize how these historical decisions still shape our country today. Addressing systemic inequality means acknowledging the past—and taking action in the present to close the gaps that persist.

In 2021, I became the first woman to head a unicorn in Israel, AKA Startup Nation. In many parts of the world, women are excluded from even the most basic financial services, so leading a fintech company is far from their reality. United Nations data estimates that 3.8 billion women live in the world, 50% of which are adults. According to the World Bank’s Global Findex Database, 1.4 billion of those 1.9 billion adult women, are unbanked. That’s 73.65%. Visit that statistic again. It represents a disturbing gender gap in financial access, with women being far less likely than men to have bank accounts or access formal financial services. This financial exclusion has personal impact. It diminishes women’s economic empowerment by restricting access to education and limiting their potential for personal growth and independence. It makes women more financially dependent, and therefore, more vulnerable. There's economic impact, too. Research by McKinsey highlights the economic loss due to financial exclusion of women, noting that closing the gender gap in labor force participation could add trillions to global GDP. Financial inclusion isn’t just a matter of equality – ensuring the same opportunities for all. It’s a matter of equity - ensuring women have the tools and access they need to fully participate in the global economy. That’s where technology enters the picture to level the field. The rise of mobile banking is a great example of innovation enhancing financial inclusion. According to a report by the International Finance Corporation, mobile money accounts are more popular among women in regions like Sub-Saharan Africa, where access to traditional banking is limited. Various fintechs provide financial literacy resources, helping women understand financial products, budgeting, and saving strategies. Other solutions include AI-driven platforms that offer personalized recommendations and advice, empowering women to make informed financial decisions. Aside from personal apps and solutions, fintechs can facilitate community-based lending and saving initiatives, allowing women to support each other through group savings or microfinance schemes, fostering a sense of solidarity and shared purpose. This International Women’s Day’s theme is "accelerate action". In my mind, nothing accelerates action like innovation. As we mark International Women's Day, let’s advocate and innovate to enhance financial inclusion for women worldwide. #IWD2025 #financialInclusion Papaya Global

Public Toilets: A Hidden Mirror of Gender Inequality “If you want to know the position of women in a particular society, look at the line formed in the toilets.” — Clara Greed, Urbanist Let’s talk facts: . 59% of women say they almost always find a huge queue for public toilets. . Only 11% of men report the same experience. . Women also spend 30 seconds more on average in the bathroom—about 80–90 seconds compared to 50–60 for men. . Yet men get more facilities—thanks to urinals. The image below says it all: ◾ 240 women → 12 toilets ◾ 240 men → 8 toilets + 8 urinals = 16 total 🕛 Total time spent? ◾ women: 2h 31min ◾ men: 1h 41min ‼️ That’s a full 50 minutes longer just because public design doesn’t account for women’s needs. As the Royal Society for Public Health points out, Europe simply does not have enough public toilets to meet women's needs. This is about more than comfort—it’s about access, dignity, and equality in public life. T 👉 The solution? It’s called #PottyParity—laws that mandate 2 or 3 toilets for women for every 1 for men. / Lezlie Lowe "No Place to Go: How Public Toilets Fail Our Private Needs"/ It’s time to stop treating public toilets like an afterthought. They’re infrastructure. And infrastructure should serve everyone—equally.  #genderequality #publicspacematters #toiletjustice #designforall #architectresses #urbaninequality sources: the image based on polish regulations https://lnkd.in/dDGsfF8F https://www.ugent.be/en https://lnkd.in/d_vZn3Sr

A woman working 8 hours a day in corporate is paid in thousands on average, while a woman working almost 8 hours at home gets paid nothing. 👉Is managing a house not working?  👉Does work done at home require no skills?  👉Is raising children and managing the elderly not a full-time job? It definitely is. But that's considered a mandatory thing to do and not a work that women do at home. As per reports, on average, women in India spend 7.2 hours a day cooking, cleaning, and caring for their household members (children, elderly, sick or disabled). I totally understand that women are the wheels for tomorrow's existence, and apart from the economic aspect, women are the torchbearers of social growth. However, the disproportionate responsibility of unpaid care work on women results in gender inequality and time poverty, which impacts their ability to progress. Now, by being vocal about shared responsibilities at home and equal participation of women in economic, social, and political sectors, we are advancing towards a more equal society. But to achieve this in the truest form, we need to give due respect for the unpaid care work that women do at large. The World Economic Forum report released in 2023 estimates that at the current rate of change, the gender gap in economic participation and opportunity will take 131 years to close. That's a massive gap, and we need to speed up. 3 changes I believe need to be brought out are: 1️⃣ Normalize men taking on an equal share of household and childcare duties. We can start teaching these values right from our home to our boys. 2️⃣ About 82% of the total number of working women in India are employed in the informal sector. Measures like minimum wage coverage, maternity leave, health insurance, and old age pension schemes should be worked on. 3️⃣ Speak up when we see or hear gender stereotypes that reinforce women's role as primary caregivers and men as breadwinners. Whether it's cooking, cleaning, or childcare - every work is "real work". While the gender gap may seem daunting, change starts with each of us speaking up in our daily lives and taking action to get 1% closer to our goal of gender equality. What are some ways you think we can increase the value of unpaid care work? #womenempowerment #unpaidwork #genderequality

Countries are off track on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, with around half of the 140 Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets for which sufficient data is available deviating from the required path. On a “business-as-usual” pathway, where social, economic and technological trends do not shift markedly from historical patterns, the SDGs as a whole would remain out of reach even in 2050. The latest 𝐅𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐒𝐮𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐃𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐨𝐩𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐑𝐞𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭 (https://lnkd.in/eykeRr8Z) reveals a critical funding gap of USD $4 trillion annually (pre-COVID $2.5 trillion, see figure 👇 ), primarily affecting developing nations. As we stand at a pivotal moment, it's clear that traditional funding methods are insufficient to meet these escalating needs, especially in the face of global challenges like climate change, inequality, and economic instability. As high as financing gap estimates are, they pale in comparison to the costs of inaction. The cumulative additional economic and social costs incurred from climate change under a business-as-usual scenario through 2050 are estimated to be almost five times larger than the climate finance needed to limit temperature increases to 1.5 degrees Celsius. Every dollar invested in risk reduction and prevention can save up to 15 dollars in post-disaster recovery efforts. 🔑 Key Insights: 🔹 Developing countries face steeper financing costs, severely hampering their sustainable development goals (SDGs). 🔹 Part of the gap is still the huge amount of (implicit) subsidies going to fossil fuels (7% of GDP 👇...this is already more than the $4 trillion that is needed) 🔹 The Role of Private Finance: Private finance emerges as a pivotal player. However, to truly make an impact, it must align more closely with sustainable development goals. It is clear that the largest part of sustainable finance is nothing else than risk mitigation (see figure 👇) 🔹 How to get better finance: ◼ Innovative Financing: Leveraging tools like green bonds and social impact investing to direct funds where they are most needed. ◼ Reforming Financial Systems: Enhancing the capacity of financial institutions to support sustainable projects through improved regulatory frameworks. ◼ Encouraging Public-Private Partnerships: These can mobilize significant resources, combining the agility of private sector innovation with the authoritative backing of public entities. As the 2025 International Conference on Financing for Development in Spain approaches, there's a collective urgency to reform our global financial systems. This is crucial not only for bridging the finance gap but also for ensuring that investments are both impactful and aligned with the global sustainable agenda.

South Africa is often spoken about as if it were a single reality, yet the data tells a different story. On one side are urban and professional households, characterised by smaller families, higher incomes, private transport, greater access to quality education and more lifestyle choices. On the other are township and rural households, where larger families, lower and less predictable incomes, reliance on public transport, and limited access to services remain common. These differences are not simply about wealth; they affect opportunities, mobility, health, education and quality of life. This comparison highlights that South Africa's greatest challenge is not a lack of potential, but the persistence of unequal access to the conditions that allow people to thrive. Bridging the gaps in education, infrastructure, employment, safety and digital connectivity would not only improve individual lives but strengthen the country's economic future and social cohesion. The opportunity before South Africa is to ensure that where a child is born does not determine the opportunities available to them for the rest of their life.

The perception among many Black Americans and other minorities that “the only thing working” in the United States is racism is rooted in persistent and measurable disparities across employment, wages, and economic stability. When job losses disproportionately impact Black men, women, and minority communities, it reinforces the belief that systemic barriers remain deeply embedded in the labor market. Despite decades of civil rights progress, data continues to show that Black and minority workers are often the first to be laid off during economic downturns and the last to be rehired during recoveries. These patterns are not incidental; they reflect structural inequities in hiring practices, access to professional networks, occupational segregation, and implicit bias that collectively limit opportunity. Additionally, the concentration of minorities in more vulnerable sectors—such as service, manufacturing, and contract-based roles—exposes them to greater economic instability. These roles are often the most sensitive to automation, outsourcing, and economic fluctuations, yet they historically provide fewer protections, benefits, and pathways for advancement. At the same time, disparities in education, wealth accumulation, and access to capital further compound these challenges, making it harder for minority workers to recover from job loss or transition into more stable industries. The result is a cycle where economic progress feels fragile and uneven, reinforcing frustration and skepticism about whether the system is functioning equitably and without bias. However, while the impact of systemic racism is real and enduring, framing it as the “only thing working” also reflects a deeper call for accountability and reform. It highlights the urgency for corporations, policymakers, and institutions to move beyond symbolic commitments to diversity and instead implement measurable, sustained changes in hiring, retention, and promotion practices. Investments in minority entrepreneurship, equitable access to capital, and targeted workforce development can begin to shift these outcomes. Ultimately, addressing these disparities is not just a matter of fairness—it is essential to building a more resilient and inclusive economy where opportunity is not predetermined by race or background.

This is the question we kept coming back to in our latest research at Shape Talent Ltd, where we surveyed over 2,300 women in the UK to better understand the persistent barriers to gender equality in corporate life. The data was stark: 🔹 98% of women face some combination of systemic barriers 🔹 Women in senior roles are more likely to feel undermined, inadequate, and cautious about speaking up 🔹 The ‘double burden’ of paid and unpaid work remains relentless and largely invisible 🔹 And the pressure to walk a narrow behavioural tightrope - the “double bind” - is alive and well But here’s what struck me most: these barriers are not just frustrating, they are predictable. They’re the result of outdated systems, norms and leadership models that still reflect a version of the workplace built around a 1950s archetype: the male breadwinner with a stay-at-home wife. It’s no wonder that are survey results showed that women, especially Black women, LGBTQ+ women, disabled women, and working mothers, continue to face uphill battles. The data shows their challenges aren’t just individual. They’re structural. And they’re compounded by bias and a chronic lack of meaningful career development. We cannot ‘fix’ women to fit into broken systems. We must fix the system. So, what next? 1. Rethink leadership expectations 2. Redesign processes with equity in mind 3. Build cultures of true psychological safety 4. Invest intentionally in women’s career development Incremental change is no longer enough. The pace of progress is glacial – and regressing. At this rate, gender equality won’t be reached until 2154. That’s five generations too late. If you're in a position of influence - HR, DEI, leadership, it’s time to move from intent to impact. Real progress starts with bold steps. #GenderEquality #Leadership #Equity #Inclusion #ShapeTalent #DoubleBurden #DoubleBind #WomenInLeadership #Intersectionality #EDI #DEI