Across the Pond

Last week the Ministry for Women presented its latest report on the situation of women in Austria . The good news is education: Women constitute slightly more than half of all people with college degrees. Gender equality at last! Let's get out the champagne, sisters! Should we? Here are some other facts: Only 7.8 percent of women with college degrees hold leading positions in the workforce, but every fourth man with a college degree works in a leading position. Women are less likely to make it into the echelons of publicly traded companies. In the year of 2008 (the last year for which data are available) there was not a single woman leading a large company in Austria. Representation among board members was six percent. Women are less likely to hold high positions in universities. Only 15.8 percent of professors are female. I find these numbers sobering enough, but what really gets me is that for the same work, women in Austria earn less money than men...

The debate over burqas has reached Austria and the approximately one hundred women who wear burqas here. Over the past two weeks Chancellor Werner Faymann and the Minister for Women, Gabriele Heinisch-Hosek (both Social Democrats), as well as the Minister of Interior, Maria Fekter (People's Party), have called for a ban on burqas. Their arguments: Traffic becomes unsafe when drivers wear full body veils; burqas are a symbol for the oppression of women. Gabriele Heinisch-Hosek said in an interview in April, "the burqa is a symbol for the disdain of women and for their discrimination". She said she was open to dialogue with all parties involved but she also called for a ban on burqas in public buildings, banks, and hospitals. The minister added: "Burqas, being clearly discriminatory, do not belong in our society. There is no room for burqas here." Let's think this through: the burqa, a full body garment worn by women in some Islamic traditions, is used i...