The Social Impact of Inequality on Gender: Mental Health, Education, and Employment

This article discusses the social impact of inequality on gender, specifically in terms of mental health, education, and employment. It highlights the challenges faced by women due to gender inequality and how it affects their lives. The article also covers topics such as job segregation, gender pay gap, and racism. The government's efforts to promote gender equality and reduce the burden on women are also discussed. The article cites various studies and research to support its claims.

POWER AND INEQUALITY

Table of Contents
Q.3 The social impact of inequality. Evaluate in relation to either race or gender........3
REFERENCES................................................................................................................10

Q.3 The social impact of inequality. Evaluate in relation to either race or gender.
Inequality is all about unfair treatment with people and the unfair situation in
society when member living there have more benefits and opportunities than other
member of society. In other words, it is social injustice which has impacted negatively
on some people's mental health. Inequality is the major issue and quite challenging in
today's era. According to Aucamp and Woodborne, (2020), inequality strongly
influences health and well-being of people specially women. The major reason behind
inequality is political power because it is both the result and cause of the social and
economic inequality.
Nowadays, social impact of inequality is mostly seen in the poorest sections of
the world's population areas. It includes mostly females, older people, person with
disabilities, and they are the one who suffers a lot. Social inequality occurs when
opportunities and benefits are distributed unequally in a given society.
Every people want to be equally treated, gender equality plays a vital role as it is
the basic human right which needs to be fulfilled. Achieving and improving gender
equality is key to ending problems like unemployment and poverty. When people get
equal rights and quality services, education and good access to medical care then it will
be beneficial for economic growth and development of society. In order to make true
progress the cycle of poverty needs to be in control and must be eliminated.
Gender inequality has major effect on mental peace of people, they have to face
depression, stress disorder and anxiety. Mental health is especially seen in females
because they experience difficult conditions such as violence. According to a 2020
article, females with mental health conditions and anxiety are less productive and
always disturbed (Kleven and et.al., 2020). As compared to male, women are more
likely to attempt suicide and many cases of suicide are seen in few countries because of
mental illness. Harassment is one of the reason which has created mental health
conditions including trauma and stress.
Gender inequality
Gender inequality is the biggest issue in which females and males are not treated
equally in few areas. Both of them may experience different type of inequality related to

culture, norms and others. In other words, gender inequality means the difference
between women and men in terms of health, status, power and employment. Due to
this, women and men has to suffer higher level of stress and mental illness.
In a survey taken of over more than 1000 girls in the year 2020, 60% of female
said that they feel males are treated better than women in the UK. They believe that
they are not getting equal treatment at school, universities, companies and even at
home.
Due to inequality in the society, many women face issues related to education
and violence. They are not allowed to pursue good education which leads to wide range
of mental health. Most of the women are facing challenges like illness as they are not
getting proper and equal treatment. They also have to suffer high levels of violence
which has negatively impacted their personal lives.
Female voices are not being heard in few companies-
Few females feel that they are unheard on issues in the companies, being bullied
in front of other, some of them feel managers are not allowing them in big decisions,
they are not getting promotions and sometimes people play politics with them.
Poor medical care
People who are living in poverty have less access to good healthcare facility. In
addition, females receive lower quality of medical treatment as compared to males. Due
to this, they have to suffer from diseases because of lack of education about harmful
diseases. As they are not getting good education and job opportunities, they are less
likely to be able to afford medical facilities at hospitals. Females die and get hospitalized
from causes which is related to childbirth, menstruation and pregnancy. Children of sick
mothers has to face problems while taking opportunities for medical care themselves.
They have to drop out of school to take care of their family members especially of
younger siblings by doing work as labour at stalls.
Lack of legal protections
According to world bank research, more than 1 billion females staff or school
going girls don't have legal protection against any kind of violence. Due to this, female
feel unsafe to visit in public and not able to enjoy freedom. In addition, there is also a

lack of legal protection against harassment in the universities, companies and even in
public areas like garden, malls and others.
Female students face inequality in the classroom
Gender inequality are holding female students back from careers, they have
experience harassment from their classmates which is quite disturbing for them.
Lower human development
It has been noted that women often experience lower human development and
other benefits as compared to men. Due to this, they have to face situations like ill
health, poor access to benefits and facilities, lower education and low employment.
Every woman or men deserves to reach their goals, but gender and race
inequalities in their lives has hinder this reality highly. They have to face some kind of
inequality in their communities, society and homes on daily basis.
Staffing and Education
According to Wilkinson, (2020), it is still possible to see social inequality related
to education system which can impact the future employment of people in the UK. Not
only females, but at some point male has to also suffer inequality. The major issue in
British education system is the difference in levels of females and male who are
employed as support staff in the school and colleges (Kalev and Deutsch, 2018).
Around 15% of teachers are men which is quite lower than compared to females. By
collecting feedbacks from students, it has been noted that there are some schools who
do not have any male teachers. Due to this issue, male students are lacking a positive
male role model in the classroom.
In some universities, there are only male staffs who are teaching subjects like
science. A lack of females educational role models in the subject like science can put
some female students off taking these sessions, they may get absent. On the negative
side, few girls in the classroom feel that male teachers cannot understand their
questions properly, and they feel shy to ask questions. Due to this, their individual
performance has impacted negatively.
It has been noted that when people are not educated on the same level, it has a
huge negative impact on their career and the various types of benefits they will get in
the future.

Gender bias in education and child marriage
nowadays, it is not entirely clear whether girls drop out of school because they
are forced to do marriage at young age or if they get married because they have
decided to not do further study. In few areas, Girls are not getting enough education and
never set foot inside a classroom in few countries. Girls who marry at young age are
very less likely to adopt facility related to quality education and suffer from high gender
discrimination (Cummins, 2018. . Instead of providing them quality education, family
member force girl child for marriage. Forced and early marriage is one of the major
issue faced by girls at very young age. Due to this they have face violence like physical
harassment and many more. This not only means that girls will lose out on effective
opportunities for better future and career but that the same thing will happen to their
own children. Girls who are of menstruating age are not getting enough knowledge
about sanitation and hygiene.
Lack of sanitation is a hot topic which came into highlight from last few years
when it comes to very basic human right policies. Being a mother and wife at the same
time becomes full time job which is quite challenging for many young women. The
burden of responsibilities have buried their dreams such as quality education (Kleven
and et.al., 2020). In some areas, mentality of people have also restricted many women
to pursue their dream job. Having a child after marriage means that they legally cannot
return to achieve quality education at school or college.
Household responsibilities
women are the one who provides unofficial care to family members especially to
their child and husband. Over caring and household responsibilities plus working at
office can negatively impact a female mental and physical health. Due to this, they have
to face issues like lack of sleep, having less time for themselves, becoming socially
isolated and many more. People think that household responsibilities and taking care of
family is the duty of women, not men. Because of this, lower self-esteem is majorly seen
in women as compared to men.
Job segregation
This is the another major issue faced due to gender inequality within
employment. In other words, people may find unequal treatment related to division of

jobs and work profile. In the most so called societies, many people believe that male
staff are better equipped to manage certain job profile and big projects in the firm. Due
to gender discrimination, women has to face lower income and fewer opportunities
(Heise and et.al., 2019). Sometimes they have to do extra work and spend more hours
at workplace but never gets recognized financially which is quite disturbing for them.
Due to this, they feel demotivated towards their work and not able to give time to their
family members. Also, sometimes they are less productive as compared to men.
Societal mindsets
Due to mindset of people about female has a significant impact on gender
inequality. People nowadays think that females cannot be able to handle big task by
their own. There mentality about women in leadership has affected many deserving
female candidate.
Land ownership and household
In few areas females have very limited influence over essential decisions about
household. In many countries, economic inequalities between gender have impacted
many lives, because females are not allowed to own land. This lack of control over
important decisions about land and household can be major issue in case of failure of
marriages.
Gender pay gap
In today's era, income inequality between males and females are retiring into
factors like poverty and unemployment. The pay gaps is mostly seen in the workplace
which contribute to gender inequality on the basis of colour. Due to factors like
occupation, educational qualification and experience in the particular field is are the
reason behind gender discrimination and pay gap. In few areas, women feel that they
will be not treated properly by the company management team, so they choose to not
participate in the market (Huang and et.al., 2020). On the other side, if the women
decided to take participate in the market they are getting lower paid projects which is
unfair. In the US, working females are overrepresented in low paying jobs. This situation
is mostly seen in male dominated industries which lead to productivity losses and loss
of individual performance.

In order to deal with this problem, many companies and its human resources
management team are promoting gender equality by being transparent about salaries,
wages, compensation and ensure females staff are receiving equal job role and benefits
if they good candidate. Ensuring that females staff not only earn the good and equal
salaries as their male collogues but also get the same access to freedom and boosts
independence in terms of promotions and other benefits.
Racism
The conversation about inequality is incomplete without talking about racism. It
has negatively impacted how much people will get against their efforts and what jobs
females of colour are able to get and many more (Azmat, Hensvik and Rosenqvist,
2020). In few areas, racism and gender inequality have been closely linked which has
affected the performance at workplace.
To conclude, Gender inequality has long-lasting consequences and a serious
issue for many people. Nowadays, it is mandatory to take counselling which will be
helpful to reduce mental health issues like trauma, depression and low self-esteem. It is
important to achieve gender equality and reduce the burden of females. In order to deal
with such issues and handling gender inequality at workplace and schools, the
government of UK is taking better steps by informing teachers and owners to meet the
specific needs of females and males. They are focusing on delivering rights to girls in
order to help support gender equality. They have taken steps like stop harassment,
save girl child and provide good education.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Aucamp, I. and Woodborne, S., 2020. Can social impact assessment improve social
well-being in a future where social inequality is rife?. Impact Assessment and
Project Appraisal. 38(2). pp.132-135.
Wilkinson, R. G., 2020. The impact of inequality: How to make sick societies healthier.
Routledge.
Cummins, I., 2018. Poverty, inequality and social work: The impact of neo-liberalism
and austerity politics on welfare provision. Policy Press.
Huang, J. and et.al., 2020. Historical comparison of gender inequality in scientific
careers across countries and disciplines. Proceedings of the National Academy
of Sciences. 117(9). pp.4609-4616.
Heise, L. and et.al., 2019. Gender inequality and restrictive gender norms: framing the
challenges to health. The Lance. 393(10189). pp.2440-2454.
Kleven, H. and et.al., 2020. Do family policies reduce gender inequality? Evidence from
60 years of policy experimentation (No. w28082). National Bureau of Economic
Research.
Kalev, A. and Deutsch, G., 2018. Gender inequality and workplace organizations:
understanding reproduction and change. Handbook of the Sociology of Gender,
pp.257-269.
Azmat, G., Hensvik, L. and Rosenqvist, O., 2020. Workplace presenteeism, job
substitutability and gender inequality.