The position of women in German society

Let’s start with a couple of historical facts. Previously, in Germany, a married woman had to grant her husband’s permission when applying for a job. What do you think when they abolished this rule? Middle Ages? 19th century? And no, in 1977.

Among the 30 DAX companies (30 German companies with the largest capitalization) there are 11 companies where there is not a single woman on the board. In general, they are only 1/9 of the board members.

But in Germany, where, according to Forbes magazine, the most influential woman in the world lives, Angela Merkel, things are not so bad. It is believed that women have never been so successful as they are today. Two areas in which this is particularly noticeable are business and politics. Today, the number of women who have received higher education and the number of working women has greatly increased. The number of women bosses has also increased.

In terms of the number of women in parliament, Germany is in 23rd place with a fairly good result – 37% of women deputies. Austria and Switzerland have no worse results: 35.5% and 32%, respectively.

It is a well-known fact, for example, that women in Austria are not so willing to use make-up, considering that it spoils the skin and should not be a mandatory component of a daily outfit.

All articles about the mentality of women in German-speaking countries claim that they (women) are independent: they open the door for themselves, put on their coats and prefer to divide the bill in a restaurant. We will not argue with this, but simply provide statistical data to support this theory: 74.5% of all women in Germany aged from 20 to 64 are employed. This is the second largest index in the EU (after Sweden). “Naturally, this is because the overall level of employment in Germany is higher,” you might argue. But then you can go even further. Look at the difference in the employment of men and women. In the EU, 76.8% of all men and 65.3% of all women are employed. By simple calculations, we calculate that men are 11.5% more busy (employed). So in Germany this difference is only 8.2% (82.7% of men and 74.5%), in Austria men are only 7.8% more employed than women (78.7% men and 70.9% women ). For comparison, in Italy this gap is 20.1% (only 51.6% of women have a permanent job). In general, the essence of this statistics is to show that German and Austrian women not only open the door for themselves, but also quietly earn their living and are financially independent.

Another great achievement in the struggle for women’s rights is the relatively common practice of maternity leave for men. Thus, women do not have to sacrifice a career for the sake of raising a common child.

Here is a brief overview of the situation of women in German-speaking societies. We leave all value judgments at your discretion.