The Equity Opportunity: Advancing Women's Economic Well-Being

Advancing Women’s Economic Well-Being

Overview

LEAP Pecaut Centre for Social Impact (LEAP) was created to address complex social issues. Our approach is to identify and scale social ventures (charities, non-profit organizations, and social enterprises) with proven interventions and programs within a curated multi-sectoral collaboration that unlocks and measures impact at every level.

The specialized approach of LEAP has scaled 25-high impact social ventures, enabling growth by a factor of 4-10x for each of these organizations and has expanded reach to two million Canadians across every province and territory.

In our early days, LEAP chose several social ventures to work with individually, but then recognized our impact could be significantly greater if we took a broader lens on an issue and worked with several social ventures across said issue, introducing its cohort model. LEAP acknowledged that leaders and organizations were individually leading impactful work; however, organizational and sectoral silos limited system-wide innovation, thereby preventing measurable change related to the root causes of these very complex issues.

In 2015, we selected our first area of focus, the Google Impact Challenge, which was working to understand how technology could be leveraged to create innovative solutions that accelerate impact.

In 2019, we selected our second area of focus: chronic disease prevention. After intensive scoping of the issue and the most impactful interventions, Healthy Futures was launched. This five-year initiative selected a cohort of 11 social ventures that represented a diversity of demographics, communities and solutions related to long-term health outcomes for Canadians.

In 2021, LEAP selected women’s economic well-being as our third area of focus, using a working definition of “women” as encompassing girls, women, and gender diverse people. We recognized that the pandemic recovery represented a unique opportunity to collaborate across sectors to accelerate inclusion of equity-deserving populations, and that investment in the economic well-being of women would have an outsized impact on all Canadians. By focusing on equitable solutions, LEAP would be contributing directly to long-term equality and Canada’s economic recovery and growth.

The selection of this area of focus led to a year of research and interviews with subject matter experts who covered diverse sectors (including academic, private, public, and social), issue areas (including poverty, gender-based violence, education, childcare, and entrepreneurship) and identities (including Black, Indigenous, People of Colour, single mothers, and women with disabilities). Through research and interviews, LEAP identified the barriers to economic access and advancement that many women in Canada face, and highlighted a continuum of interventions that need to be scaled to achieve our collective goals.

This report is the culmination of that effort and is the essential groundwork for what’s next. The Equity Opportunity : Advancing Women’s Economic Well-Being, will begin with the selection of the cohort of organizations that, over a five-year period, will be scaled both individually and as a cohort to collectively and collaboratively propel economic equity.

Executive Summary

The Problem

While Canada has consistently achieved incremental improvements toward gender equality, women in Canada continue to experience higher rates of poverty and violence than men do, and are paid lower wages, overrepresented in precarious work, underrepresented in leadership roles, and are responsible for a disproportionate share of unpaid domestic and caregiving labour.

This is not purely an economic problem but a complex intractable issue, no single organization, or sector, is equipped to solve on its own. To effectively address the problem, there is an opportunity to do things differently, and bring all sectors together to leverage knowledge, insights, expertise, and resources to foster collaborative strategies that support and scale the innovative solutions closest to the problem.

Canada’s reality in 2022

Progress to date has led to unequal advancement for women. Women from equity deserving groups (including racialized women, Indigenous women, immigrant women, women with low socioeconomic status, women with disabilities, single mothers, and the LGBTQ2S+ community) experience additional barriers to economic well-being, and the negative consequences are further compounded for women who occupy multiple marginalized identities.

We cannot make meaningful progress towards equitable advancement of economic well-being without doing better for the women who face the largest barriers

Of the 19M women in Canada5 there are*:

4.3M immigrants (15+) 6

The ways in which Canadian women were disproportionately impacted by the pandemic, related policies and isolation measures

800K women were removed from the workforce during the peak of the pandemic14

27 additional hours/week were spent by women on childcare, compared with 13 hours/week for men15

12x as many mothers as fathers left their jobs to care for toddlers or school-aged children16

*Women of colour was calculated as visible minority - black

The COVID-19 pandemic threatens to reverse gender equality gains

During the COVID-19 pandemic, economic losses have fallen heavily on women due to their overrepresentation in the hardest-hit sectors. In addition to the direct economic losses resulting from unemployment and lost wages, pandemic-related policies and isolation measures contributed to an increase in domestic violence, greater burdens of domestic and caregiving responsibilities, and reduced access to social support services. The pandemic also exacerbated existing inequalities and was particularly challenging for women from equity-deserving groups.

There is an urgent need for structural rethinking and systemic change to propel inclusion beyond pre-pandemic levels. The pandemic recovery provides an opportunity to invest in new approaches to create a more equitable and resilient future for all women in Canada.

LEAP’s role in envisioning the road ahead

In this report, we have identified several drivers that impact women’s economic well-being: basic needs and social supports, education and training, the opportunity cost of caregiving, and workforce opportunity. In addition, the overarching setting of societal and institutional norms, which influence and permeate each of the drivers, is critical to any investment in women’s economic well-being.

Throughout Canada, leaders from diverse organizations across sectors are creating innovative and impactful solutions that address these drivers. However, organizational and sectoral silos too often stymie innovation and collaboration. As a result, leaders often lack the financial capital, networks, partnerships, and support to grow their solutions, reach more women across Canada, and challenge the status quo at scale.

Through an innovative venture philanthropy model, LEAP’s mandate is to scale what works. By focusing on the highest-value interventions, we catalyze large-scale social impact within each individual social venture, across a cohort of organizations, and through strategic multi-sectoral collaboration, ultimately to elevate society as a whole.

TheEquityOpportunity: AdvancingWomen’sEconomicWell-Being

Our Goal

LEAP is launching a five-year initiative that seeks to build an equitable and resilient future for women in Canada, particularly those from equity-deserving groups.

Our Investment Thesis

LEAP will scale innovative, high-impact solutions that address both the long-standing barriers preventing women from achieving full economic well-being, and that expand economic opportunities. LEAP will prioritize investments in social ventures supporting women from equity-deserving groups, who experience additional barriers to economic wellbeing resulting from intersecting institutional and systemic discrimination.

LEAP will select leaders and social ventures that are working to address the barriers women face when it comes to their economic well-being. The social ventures will have programs and services whose mandates are focused on economic outcomes that recognize the correlation and compounding effects of the barriers. Programs and services will take a comprehensive approach toward one or more of the key drivers of women’s economic well-being: basic needs and social supports, education and training, the opportunity cost of caregiving, and workforce opportunity, to ensure every woman is able to advance relative to starting circumstances.

Our Impact

Through LEAP’s highly specialized approach, the number of women who are economically secure will increase, the social ventures that support women will be more sustainable, and the structural support and cooperation between organizations and sectors will be strengthened.

At the end of the five years, The Equity Opportunity will have scaled impact of social ventures and the cohort, with direct positive outcomes on the personal stability, financial security, and economic empowerment of women from equity-deserving groups. Through this initiative, we will collectively increase women’s income as well as expand their employment and entrepreneurial opportunities.

More broadly, this initiative will help facilitate transformative change by contributing to a more equitable and resilient future based on transformed societal and institutional norms, a strengthened and modernized social sector, and the individual and collective empowerment of women.

Join us

Through The Equity Opportunity, we are committed to joining the many leaders who have tirelessly worked to advance gender equality in Canada.

Through TheEquityOpportunity, we will help create this equitable and resilient future by:

Selecting innovative, high-impact solutions supporting women from equity-deserving groups;

Providing strategic advice, scaling support, and pro bono professional services from best-in-class partners to exponentially grow each organization’s reach and quality of services and programs;

Supplying funding to support scaling strategy;

Encouraging collaboration within the cohort and the social sector to effectively address and serve the intersectional needs of women; and

Facilitating collaboration across the public, private, and social sectors.

Through this initiative, LEAP aims to contribute to the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for a more equitable, sustainable future with a focus on Gender Equality (5), Decent Work and Economic Growth (8), and No Poverty (1). We recognize that no stakeholder can transform the economic well-being of women in Canada alone. The Equity Opportunity seeks to foster collaborative strategies and leverage cross-sector knowledge, insights, expertise, and resources to scale high-impact solutions. LEAP believes that together we can educate, inform, influence, finance, and scale innovative solutions. We invite you to join us.

We need to break down silos, team up, and cover more ground. The gaps are wide, so organizations working in partnership can more effectively support a woman with every tool she needs to move forward.

Paulette Senior, President and CEO, Canadian Women’s Foundation

Overarching Setting: Societal and Institutional Norms

Societal and institutional norms influence and permeate each driver and either hinder or advance women’s progress on their journey towards economic well-being.

Across the four key drivers: basic needs and social support, education and training, opportunity cost of caregiving, and workforce opportunity, women face systemic barriers resulting from societal and institutional norms.

These norms permeate both the most micro-levels of society (within daily interactions and personal, familial, and community relationships) and the macro-level (within social structures, corporate processes, and institutional policies). These norms are rooted in gendered assumptions of domestic and caregiving responsibilities, professional and political positions, and innate talents or personality traits. Societal and institutional norms are maintained, perpetuated, and reproduced by policies, laws, procedures, practices, and everyday behaviours.

The presence and imposition of socially constructed roles and gendered characteristics can greatly hinder women’s ability to enter, remain, and advance within the workforce, as well as achieve greater economic well-being. To advance women’s economic well-being, systems of power perpetuating inequities must be understood and challenged. Moreover, we should aim to account for the historical and social disadvantages preventing women from operating as equals, transform power relations, and challenge deeply rooted gender roles and expectations. Shifting entrenched norms, attitudes, behaviours, and biases is complex but necessary to create transformative and long-lasting change.

LEAP is seeking to raise awareness of the harmful consequences of gendered norms, identify and conceptualize alternatives to the status quo, partner with women to understand their lived experiences, and scale solutions that acknowledge the importance of this overarching setting. By working with each social venture, the cohort, our private sector partners, and other sectors to challenge and change societal and institutional norms, we intend to create lasting shifts that directly contribute to long-term equality and Canada’s economic recovery and growth.

Exploring the drivers

This section explores each driver, identifying key challenges and opportunities for collaborative action to remove barriers and advance women’s economic well-being.

Driver 1: Basic Needs and Social Support

Women must have their basic needs met before they can begin to build personal stability and financial security.

Overview

Women’s basic needs must be met before they can realistically pursue opportunities to advance their economic well-being.

In this section, we explore the following key barriers and challenges:

1. Poverty is gendered and disproportionately impacts women from equity-deserving groups

2. Women are at a heightened risk of experiencing gender-based violence (GBV), which impacts their safety, security, and holistic well-being

Barriers and Challenges

1

Poverty is in many respects gendered and disproportionately impacts women from equity-deserving groups

Gendered poverty is a vicious cycle impacting close to two million women in Canada, their children, dependents, and future generations.17 Women experience higher rates of poverty than men partly due to the gender pay gap (the difference in average earnings of people based on gender) which is directly connected to fields of study and work, career advancement opportunities, and time allocated to unpaid care.18 Over a lifetime, the compounding gender pay gap coupled with Canada’s chronic housing unaffordability, among other factors, traps women and their families in a cycle of poverty that persists for generations to follow.

High rates of poverty among single mothers

To break the cycle of generational poverty, there is a need to invest in both single mothers and their children.

Single parents have one of the highest poverty rates in Canada. This is especially acute for women, as 14.6% of single mothers in Canada raise their children while living in poverty compared with 8.5% of single fathers.25 Additionally, women-led lone-parent households are also the most likely to experience food insecurity.26 This can be partially attributed to the gender wage gap, as single fathers on average have higher incomes than single mothers.27

Women of Colour 19 Immigrant women20 Black women21 Indigenous women22 Transgender women23 Women with disabilities24

For women in poverty to transition into financially stable positions, they first require support and services to meet their needs for housing and nutritious food.

2021 Pan-Canadian Housing and Homelessness survey*

86% 60% 80%

of participants didn’t have enough to cover necessities after paying for housing. 28

of single mothers and women from equitydeserving groups reported significant discrimination from landlords and property managers, in many cases leading to barriers to accessing housing or housing loss. 29

Women are more likely than men to experience intimate partner violence (IPV)

more likely to experience IPV

The risk of IPV is heightened for women with intersecting identities

86% Single mothers and trans women

69% Indigenous women

Women with severe disabilities

*participants were 500 women and gender diverse people

The housing market is

astronomically above what

can afford, and as a result, people are living in substandard conditions and housing.

In the Pan-Canadian Survey on Domestic Violence and the Workplace, 81.9% of individuals exposed to domestic violence reported it negatively affected their performance at work, and 8.5% indicated they lost their job as a result31 .

Women are at a heightened risk of experiencing GBV, which impacts their safety, security, and holistic well-being

Despite the high incidence of GBV, demand for shelters consistently exceeds capacity. In 2019, on a typical day, shelters and transition houses had to turn away 79% of women and children fleeing violence.32 Since the COVID-19 pandemic, GBV has grown, and chronically underfunded services have struggled to meet the increased demand. Domestic violence adversely impacts mental health, and the risk of developing depression, post-traumatic stress disorder, substance abuse issues, or feeling suicidal, is three to five times higher for women who have experienced violence in their relationships.33 However, there is a shortage of accessible, affordable, and traumainformed support services to help women overcome physical and psychological barriers.34 High fees associated with counseling and legal services also prevent many survivors from effectively addressing the aftermath of their trauma. Survivors require safe spaces accompanied by support services to help them heal before they can transition into the workforce and move forward in their journey towards economic well-being.

17 16

people

Bernadette Smith, Member of the Legislative Assembly, Point Douglas, Manitoba

of participants reported not being able to afford a place.

Women living in poverty in Canada experience widespread chronic housing affordability issues.

Violence Faced by Indigenous Women

Given the high rates of violence, there is a need for increased access to and investment in safe spaces for Indigenous women fleeing violence that can support their immediate needs and equip them with the tools to build their personal stability and financial security.

Indigenous women disproportionately experience discrimination, harassment, GBV, and violent crimes due to systemic discrimination and institutional racism.35 Indigenous women in Canada report rates of violence (including sexual and physical assault, armed robbery, violent threats, and homicide) three times higher than non-Indigenous women.36 Six in ten Indigenous women in Canada experience physical or sexual abuse, and the mortality rate for domestic violence against Indigenous women is three to five times greater than that of the non-Indigenous population.37

Driver 2: Education and Training

Education and training, both formal and informal, directly impacts women’s access to employment opportunities, and thus their financial security.

Potential Opportunities and Solutions

Immediate action is needed to meet the basic needs of women in Canada. However, no stakeholder can end gendered poverty or violence alone. LEAP believes there are emerging opportunities to collaborate across government, private, philanthropic, and social sectors to develop and scale innovative solutions to these long-standing problems and accelerate progress. To address the barriers related to women’s basic needs and social supports, some examples of collective solutions include:

Expanding investments in community services that address the scope of basic needs of women that provide the foundation required to pursue opportunities to advance their economic well-being

For example, there are many opportunities to invest in trauma-informed and culturally responsive initiatives for women in poverty and women experiencing GBV, as well as provide safe spaces and shelter to ensure women have the capacity to focus on their personal stability and financial security.

Taking action to close the gender pay gap, which is a key contributor to gendered poverty

For example, there are many opportunities to increase transparency and pay equality, including by disaggregating data to identify unequal pay practices and address the disparities through policy, organizational and cultural changes.

Overview

Education and training can unlock possibilities to improve the economic well-being of girls and women, their families, and communities for generations. However, the pandemic exposed and accelerated the undeniable inequalities in the education system, setting behind girls and women from equity-deserving groups. There is also a large gap in women’s attainment of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education and skilled trades certification, leading to their consistent underrepresentation in many high-wage professional careers.38

In this section, we explore the following key barriers and challenges:

1. Girls and women from equity-deserving groups face additional barriers to accessing formal education and training

2. Girls and women are underrepresented in education programs directly linked to employment in high-growth fields, which are traditionally dominated by men, thereby reinforcing the gender wage gap

Barriers & Challenges

Girls and women from equity-deserving groups face additional barriers to accessing formal education and training

Canada has grown to outperform many other comparable countries in women’s education and literacy levels; however, assessments are often conducted on an aggregate level without accounting for specific barriers facing girls and women from equity-deserving groups. Studies reinforce that girls and women who face multiple disadvantages such as having a low family income, living in remote or underserved locations, having a disability, experiencing violence, or belonging to a minority ethno-linguistic group are furthest behind in terms of access to and completion of education.39 As the pandemic increased the cost of education and necessitated digital learning, girls and women from equity-deserving groups faced heightened barriers in receiving the resources they need including technology, internet connectivity, and financial support to access education.

Indigenous Women’s Access to Education

Due to the massive impact of intergenerational trauma, Indigenous women may face difficulties absorbing and internalizing information. This in turn impacts their ability to begin and complete their education. To better support Indigenous women, educational institutions and informal training programs must recognize and address the unique needs and circumstances of Indigenous women.

Arlene Hache, Executive Director of the Keepers of the Circle

Indigenous women face much greater challenges in accessing education. Between the ages of 25 and 64, only 52% of Indigenous women have some type of post-secondary education, compared with 67.4% of non-Indigenous women.40 This is partially due to the fact that Indigenous women lack access to the funding necessary to cover tuition and often enter post-secondary education as mature students, thus requiring assistance with housing and childcare.41

Girls and women are underrepresented in education programs directly linked to employment in high-growth fields which are traditionally dominated by men, thereby reinforcing the gender wage gap

Girls and women face considerable challenges participating, remaining, and succeeding in fields traditionally dominated by men. This disadvantages them, as employment in these areas provides significant economic opportunities through better employment conditions, higher pay, job stability, and permanency.42 Girls and women are less inclined to enter STEM fields, the skilled trades, and other fields traditionally dominated by men due to unwelcoming workplace cultures, gendered discrimination, micro-aggressions, and harmful stereotypes and assumptions.

While many girls initially express interest in STEM professions, their representation drops off throughout their education and employment paths At ages 12-13, young girls interest in pursuing STEM subjects drops.

Potential Opportunities and Solutions

LEAP believes there are emerging opportunities to collaborate across government, private, philanthropic, and social sectors to develop and scale innovative solutions to these longstanding problems and accelerate progress. Cross-sectoral collaboration can help ensure that education and training meet the needs of girls and women in Canada, and equips them with the knowledge and skills to pursue and attain decent work. To address the barriers related to access to education, some examples of collective solutions include:

Enhancing current programs, developing new initiatives, and investing in solutions that address inequity in education to meet the needs of girls and women from equity-deserving groups, directly impacting their access to employment opportunities, and thus their financial security

Scholarships and bursaries are particularly impactful for single mothers and Indigenous women. Despite this, funding is often pulled. We require more funding to meet the demand for education.

Bernadette Smith, Member of the Legislative Assembly, Point Douglas, Manitoba

Championing women’s entry and advancement in fields traditionally dominated by men

This will ultimately increase representation and visibility of women in key leadership and decision-making roles, contributing to transformative change.

Driver 3: Opportunity Cost of Caregiving

The burden on women to perform caregiving work hinders their employment and advancement opportunities.

Overview

Despite increases in workforce participation, women have retained primary responsibility for childcare, eldercare, and housework – tasks traditionally undervalued in Canadian society.47 As a result, women are more likely to leave, and have greater difficulty returning to the workforce, which has a direct effect on their employment and earnings. Gender norms position women as natural caregivers with an in-born ability to perform care work. This influences attitudes and perceptions, with almost 75% of women in Canada acknowledging the expectation for them to assume traditional gender roles.48 Adopting this role often results in women having less access to and control over family and household finances, which reinforces their unequal status.

In this section, we explore the following key barriers and challenges:

1. Lack of access to quality childcare and eldercare is keeping women underemployed and out of the workforce

2. Women face barriers re-entering the workforce after extended periods of absence

Barriers and Challenges

Lack of access to quality childcare and eldercare is keeping women underemployed and out of the workforce

Despite Canada’s recent strides towards affordable childcare with the $10-a-day childcare program, significant gaps persist that prevent women from remaining in the workforce and achieving their professional goals. To close these gaps, Canada needs to expand access to quality care facilities, recruit and retain early childhood educators, and compensate for the unpaid care disproportionately provided by women. The lack of affordable and accessible childcare in Canada stagnates economic growth by pushing mothers into part-time work or out of the workforce to take on domestic responsibilities and keeps them out of the workforce long after they want to return.

In addition to high costs, the lack of licensed childcare spaces limits the choices parents have when it comes to raising their children and re-entering the workforce.49 An estimated 44% of all non-school-aged children in Canada live in communities that do not have licensed childcare.50 Given these restrictions, families must make tough decisions, which often result in mothers who tend to be the lower earners giving up their jobs. 32% of mothers say they’ve had to put their career on the back burner to manage home or parenting responsibilities, in comparison with 21% of fathers.51

The disproportionate impact of unpaid care work on women is also reflected in the care for the elderly. Many elderly people who require care choose not to obtain it, or cannot. This is often due to personal reasons, cultural practices, or concerns about quality standards.52 Or, the inverse, an individual may wish to use long-term care services, but finds them difficult to navigate, faces long waitlists, or cannot afford the fees. Given these barriers, there is a push towards at-home care for older relatives, and women are 73% more likely to permanently leave work and five times more likely than men to be working part-time than men to accommodate this care.53 The demand for long-term care in Canada is also projected to grow to an additional 199,000 beds by 2035, much of which will be unmet by existing facilities, thus accelerating the trend for at-home long-term care.54

Women face barriers re-entering the workforce after extended periods of absence

Women face more obstacles when trying to re-enter the workforce due to intersecting societal and institutional norms. For example, women returning to work are more likely to be subject to certain biases, such as being perceived as less committed, less dependable, and less authoritative. Mothers face additional barriers to re-entry because of the “motherhood penalty,” whereby women after childbirth face both a lack of policies around flexible work to accommodate domestic responsibilities and a sharp

decline in income, which greatly affect their return from a career break.55 Additionally, women encounter wider skill and wage gaps, which have direct effects on their employment and earnings in addition to the loss of economic opportunity due to leaving the workforce. For women who exit the workforce, 93% want to return to their careers full-time, but only 40% do so successfully.56 Many of them cite family responsibilities as the main barrier to acquiring the necessary skill sets to address career gaps, such as participation in education and training.57

Potential Opportunities and Solutions

LEAP believes there are emerging opportunities to collaborate across government, private, philanthropic, and social sectors to develop and scale innovative solutions to these longstanding problems and accelerate progress. Cross-sectoral collaboration can help address the opportunity cost of caregiving to give women and their families options for financial stability and workforce participation. To address the barriers related to the opportunity cost of caregiving, some examples of collective solutions include:

Increasing access to quality child and eldercare facilitating employment and advancement opportunities for women

The economic and social benefits of affordable and accessible childcare are significant and well-documented. Childcare stimulates economic growth by increasing employment and spending. Quebec, which has the strongest regulated early learning and childcare networks with space available for 62.5% of children ages 1-5, has seen the highest workforce participation among women of prime parenting age.58

Developing and adapting policies and practices to help women re-enter the workforce during and following an absence related to caregiving responsibilities

Driver 4: Workforce Opportunity

To achieve economic wellbeing, women require equitable availability of employment and entrepreneurial resources, alongside access to human, financial, and social capital.

Overview

Despite progress made, women in Canada continue to face barriers entering, remaining, and advancing in the workforce.

In this section, we explore the following key barriers and challenges:

1. Women’s overrepresentation in low-wage, precarious work

2. Gender biases that perpetuate wage and leadership gaps

3. Impediments to women’s workforce advancement due to limited access to networks, mentors, and sponsors

4. Limited access to entrepreneurial resources

Helping women realize their professional aspirations creates a ripple effect that benefits greater society. As women succeed in their respective careers, their ability to exert positive change increases in scale, with more women exerting political influence, controlling economic resources, and impacting their families and communities. By closing the gaps between men and women in workforce participation, leadership, and entrepreneurship, Canada can increase its gross domestic product (GDP) as well as drive growth, innovation, and overall economic well-being.

Barriers and Challenges

Women’s overrepresentation in low-wage, precarious work impedes their personal stability and financial security

Additional investments and targeted support are needed to create decent work opportunities and healthy workplaces for women. Work and working conditions are essential contributors to social equality within and across generations. Despite its potential to enhance the quality of life of women via earnings, precarious work (poorly paid, unprotected, and insecure employment) can be alienating, exploitative, and even dangerous. The Canadian Standards Association defines psychologically healthy and safe workplaces as those that promote employees’ psychological well-being and actively work to prevent harm to psychological health.59 Many jobs fail to provide women with psychologically healthy and safe workplaces, exposing women to excessive workloads, low individual control, unstable work, unfulfilling work, violence, abuse of authority, discrimination, and harassment.

Women are more likely than men to be employed in precarious work, which can lead to long-term in-work poverty, insecure living, and social isolation.60 Women’s overrepresentation in precarious work is due to a variety of factors including a lack of professional networks and disproportionate burdens of unpaid domestic and caregiving labour. Racialized, immigrant, and undocumented women are most likely to be represented in the lowest paying and most precarious of care jobs.61 This was amplified in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, during which women were overrepresented in precarious work involving the “5 Cs” (caring, clerical, catering, cashiering, and cleaning), placing them at the highest risk on the frontlines of the pandemic.

Consequently, to improve economic well-being, targeted support is required to assist women in their transition from precarious to decent work – which should represent the future of all work.

By focusing on groups at the outer margins, we are covering everyone else, and the more we increase visibility of the intersectionality of women, the more we can work towards changing norms and standards and increasing the value of those women.

Gender biases perpetuate wage and leadership gaps

Women face various gender biases in the workforce, exemplified through hiring practices, unwelcoming work environments, and fewer advancement opportunities than men. Gendered occupational segregation (the notion that men and women should work in certain roles or industries) contributes to the persistent gender pay inequality as well as the underrepresentation of women in high-paying industries and key decision-making roles. This further exacerbates existing biases, as individuals often subconsciously assume that women’s underrepresentation in certain industries or roles is due to inherent gendered characteristics or norms. According to Statistics Canada, women make 71% of what men make in annual wages, salaries, and commissions, and occupy only 35% of managerial positions.62

sponsors

While networks, mentors, and sponsors are powerful enablers of workforce advancement and strong mechanisms for positive and transformative change, women are less likely than men to have access to them. Men benefit from mentors who take an active interest in their career by sharing their experience, encouraging new ways of thinking, and helping them learn new skills as well as sponsors who advocate for their advancement. In a 2017 study, researchers found that women receive far fewer promotions and advancement opportunities, in part due to the lack of sponsorship opportunities within their organization. Of the companies surveyed in the study, approximately half had leadership training, networking, and mentoring in place, but only 22% had a formal sponsorship program, and none had tailored programs for women.63

Women’s equal participation in decision-making is crucial for recovery and well-being, but gender parity remains far off…

It is more challenging for women to advance in the workforce due to limited access to networks, mentors, and

Ingrid Palmer, Director of Networks and Relationships, Toronto Neighborhood Centres

Women have limited access to entrepreneurial resources

Women face compounding barriers – including lack of access to capital, networks and mentors, and significant time constraints due to caregiving responsibilities – that make entrepreneurship a difficult space. Interestingly, there are increasing numbers of entrepreneurs - many of them women - creating solutions to address these challenges.

Bonnie Foley-Wong, Founder of Pique Ventures

Women-owned businesses generate, on average, 10% higher cumulative revenues over a five-year period than men-owned businesses; however, women entrepreneurs continue to face barriers in seeking and obtaining the financial capital needed to start and grow their businesses.71 In a Women’s Enterprise Organization of Canada survey of 400 women entrepreneurs, 61% said current funding models do not fit their needs due to factors such as narrow eligibility criteria and bias during the application process, with even larger barriers reported for Black Indigenous and People of Colour (BIPOC) entrepreneurs.72

In addition to capital, women entrepreneurs lack access to networks and mentors, and face significant time constraints due to domestic and care responsibilities. While networks and mentors have proven benefits for entrepreneurs, such as increasing their reach, influence, and confidence in making business decisions,73 women must invest more time and energy than men do to make meaningful connections and enter professional circles. Additionally, 53% of women entrepreneurs face extra childcare burdens, compared to 12% of men entrepreneurs.74 Furthering these barriers, the COVID-19 pandemic increased stressors on women entrepreneurs who were forced to juggle increased household responsibilities with work. The compounding effects take an emotional toll, as women are constantly battling gender norms, requiring them to work harder and invest more time to prove themselves and build credibility.

There are a lot of expectations put on women entrepreneurs. Women entrepreneurs are expected to prove their track record, while men are given access to capital and opportunity based on potential alone. To change these expectations, we must explore power dynamics around capital – including who has it, and who is distributing it.

Paulina Cameron, CEO of The Forum

Potential Opportunities and Solutions

LEAP believes there are emerging opportunities to collaborate across government, private, philanthropic, and social sectors to develop and scale innovative solutions to these longstanding problems and accelerate progress. Workforce opportunity is a key driver of women’s economic well-being, and to expand workforce opportunities for women, each sector needs to examine how it hinders or advances women’s workforce opportunity. To address the barriers related to women’s workforce opportunities, some examples of collective solutions include:

Challenging the status quo

To address the root causes of institutional and systemic discrimination embedded within the workforce, we need to challenge unequal systems of power and work together to change policies, laws, practices, and social norms that hinder workforce opportunities for women.

Performing data-driven analyses on equity and diversity

Sometimes you need more than proportional representation to achieve equity. We need to hold large corporations accountable to who they are hiring, why, and whether they reflect our society.

Anila Lee Yuen, President and CEO of the Centre for Newcomers

Increasing representation and visibility of women in leadership across communities, organizations, and sectors

The underrepresentation of diverse women in key decision-making roles hurts Canada’s economic pandemic recovery efforts. If we are to improve in that regard, women must have equal representation at decision-making tables to build inclusive and sustainable solutions for the communities they represent and understand. Diverse women bring different perspectives and lived experiences, which are critical to adequately understanding Canada’s intractable problems and developing sustainable and transformative solutions.

Building networks, mentorship, and sponsorship programs for women

Investing in networks, mentorship, and sponsorship programs designed for women, particularly those from equity-deserving groups, is critical to women’s career progression and economic well-being. Mentorship and sponsorship networks are strong mechanisms for positive and transformative change, allowing women to share resources and personal insights, provide mutual emotional support, and generate a stronger sense of community.

Investing in reskilling and upskilling for women

Reskilling and upskilling programs can prepare women to transition into high-growth industries and positions with long-term career development. These are powerful tools to help women remain and advance within the workforce, allowing them to obtain the skills needed to make transitions as well as enable Canada to take advantage of untapped talent.

Support women entrepreneurs in starting and growing their businesses

Supporting women entrepreneurs not only increases the growth and success of their businesses, but also impacts broader societal and institutional norms, as women business owners’ control greater economic resources and can impact their communities on a scale few others can. Women founders are more likely to hire other women, and on average, women comprise 66% of the workforce of women-led businesses.75 By closing the entrepreneurship gap between men and women, Canada has the potential to increase GDP by $81 billion as well as drive growth, innovation, and overall economic well-being. 76

Taking action

To advance progress on women’s economic well-being in Canada, we need to work together and collaborate across government, private, philanthropic and the social sector, as no stakeholder is equipped to transform the economic well-being of women in Canada on its own.

Given the complexities and nuances of the issue, and that each woman is on a unique journey towards economic well-being, LEAP will select a diverse cohort of social ventures, each focused on one or more of the key drivers of women’s economic wellbeing: basic needs and social supports, education and training, the opportunity cost of caregiving, and workforce opportunity, together addressing the barriers outlined throughout the report.

LEAP is committed to fostering cross-sector collaboration and leveraging insights, expertise, and resources to collectively develop and scale impactful solutions to accelerate progress. And we invite you to join us.

Jill Earthy, CEO of InBC Investment Corp.

We need more holistic programs with access to different types of capital, mentorship, education, and a community of support to accelerate the advancement of women entrepreneurs.

TheEquityOpportunity: AdvancingWomen’sEconomicWell-Being

Our Goal

LEAP is launching a five-year initiative that seeks to build an equitable and resilient future for women in Canada, particularly those from equity-deserving groups.

Our Investment Thesis

LEAP will scale innovative, high-impact solutions that address both the long-standing barriers preventing women from achieving full economic well-being, and that expand economic opportunities. LEAP will prioritize investments in social ventures supporting women from equity-deserving groups, who experience additional barriers to economic well-being resulting from intersecting institutional and systemic discrimination.

LEAP will select leaders and social ventures who are working to address the barriers women face when it comes to their economic well-being. The social ventures will have programs and services whose mandates are focused on economic outcomes, that recognize the correlation and compounding effects of the barriers. Programs and services will take a comprehensive approach toward one or more of the key drivers of women’s economic well-being: basic needs and social supports, education and training, the opportunity cost of caregiving, and workforce opportunity, to ensure every woman is able to advance relative to their starting circumstances.

Our Impact

Through LEAP’s highly specialized approach, the number of women who are economically secure will increase, the social ventures that support women will be more sustainable, and the structural support and cooperation between organizations and sectors will be strengthened.

At the end of the five years, The Equity Opportunity will have scaled impact of social ventures and the cohort, with direct positive outcomes on the personal stability, financial security, and economic empowerment of women from equity-deserving groups. Through this initiative, we will collectively increase women’s income as well as expand their employment and entrepreneurial opportunities.

More broadly, this initiative will contribute to a more equitable and resilient future based on transformed societal and institutional norms, a strengthened and modernized social sector, and the individual and collective empowerment of women.

LEAP’s Model

Based on our experience, expertise, and track record in scaling social impact, LEAP’s model prioritizes the selection of, and investment in, leaders and social ventures with proven approaches that are committed to understanding the multidimensional root causes of issues and subsequently designing innovative and impactful communityinformed solutions.

Further, scaling social impact is more effective when working with a cohort of organizations with shared goals related to an issue, yet with diverse approaches and programs that complement each other and allow for scaling synergies. Finally, when required, we leverage the pro bono professional services of our private sector partners, Boston Consulting Group, Ernst & Young, Google.org, Hill + Knowlton Strategies, Marts & Lundy and McCarthy Tétrault, all business leaders in their respective industries.

LEAP will select and scale a diverse group of social ventures, each focused on one or more of the key drivers presented in this report. Collectively, the cohort will address the intersecting inequities hindering women’s economic well-being and ultimately contribute to the transformation of societal and institutional norms.

Through LEAP’s four-stage process, TheEquityOpportunity will evolve as follows:

Define

Through research and consultations with subject matter experts, LEAP has defined the issues underlying women’s economic well-being and identified a landscape of highimpact solutions.

Select

A data-driven due diligence process will be used to select up to 10 social ventures with high-impact, scalable, community-informed solutions. We take a cohort-based approach that captures the diversity of solutions required to address the complexities of the barriers to women’s economic well-being. LEAP will select a cohort of social ventures with innovative scalable solutions that together optimize for synergies, cohesion, and overall social impact.

Invest

LEAP invests in a thoughtfully curated portfolio of like-minded social ventures, facilitating growth and development through peer-to-peer learning, creation of new opportunities, collaboration, and partnerships to leverage the diversity of strengths across the cohort. Alongside cohort-based activities, LEAP will help each individual social venture scale its programs and services by a factor of 4-10x.

Over five years, considering the stage of development and unique needs of each organization, LEAP’s expertise provides:

• Tailored, hands-on strategic engagements in areas including, but not limited to, growth strategy, scaling plans, revenue development, and governance;

• Support to leadership with coaching and board development;

• Access to leverage millions of dollars of private sector pro bono professional services in areas including, but not limited to, fundraising, legal compliance, and government relations; and

• Funding to support scaling strategy.

Sustain

We curate collaborative cohorts of innovative social entrepreneurs to learn, share insights, and develop partnerships, as well as disseminate results, learnings, resources, and tools to support the evolution of the social sector in Canada to collectively impact the lives of millions of Canadians.

Apply Now

Are you a social venture committed to improving the economic wellbeing of women in Canada?

To apply, visit https://fs24.formsite.com/i3l2I4/jo0iwowtpz/index.html

LEAP’s Investment Criteria

TheEquityOpportunity will be comprised of a cohort of social ventures that meet the following criteria:

Eligibility of social ventures: Social ventures include registered charities, non-profit organizations, and social enterprises. Eligible social ventures must operate in Canada.

Alignment with key drivers: LEAP will focus on innovative, scalable, community-informed solutions that focus on one or more of the key drivers of women’s economic well-being: basic needs and social supports, education and training, the opportunity cost of caregiving, and workforce opportunity.

Serving equity-deserving populations and communities: LEAP will prioritize investments in social ventures supporting racialized women, Indigenous women, immigrant women, women with low socioeconomic status, women with disabilities, single mothers, and the LGBTQ2S+ community.

Dynamic, inclusive leadership: LEAP’s model prioritizes investment in social entrepreneurs and dynamic leaders committed to our ethos to do good, better. Moreover, LEAP invests in leaders who seek to address inequities and promote diversity and inclusion throughout their social venture.

Innovative, high-impact solutions: LEAP seeks to invest in programs that utilize unique or innovative approaches to create meaningful, measurable economic outcomes.

Potential for scale: LEAP seeks social ventures with strong strategic vision and/or program models to scale impact by 4-10x through innovation, technology, and collaboration.

Organizational readiness:

LEAP aims to partner with social ventures with demonstrated operational capacity and partnerships to engage in a five-year partnership with The Equity Opportunity and sustain its scale over time.

Glossary

Care Work: Work of looking after the physical, psychological, emotional, and developmental needs of one or more other people.77

Decent Work: Opportunities for work that are productive and respect the fundamental rights of the person as well as the rights of workers.78 Decent work delivers a fair income, security in the workplace and social protection for families; better prospects for personal development and social integration, freedom for people to express their concerns, organize and participate in the decisions that affect their lives and equality of opportunity and treatment for all women and men.79

Domestic Violence: A form of GBV, domestic violence refers to any act of physical, sexual, psychological, or economic violence that occurs within a family or domestic unit, irrespective of biological or legal family ties.80 Domestic violence is not restricted to those who share the same residence and can occur between intimate partners (often referred to as intimate partner violence), siblings, parents and children, and the elderly.81

Equity: Equity recognizes that each person has different circumstances and allocates the exact resources and opportunities needed to reach an equal outcome.82

Equity-Deserving Groups: Communities that identify barriers to equal access, opportunities, and resources due to disadvantage and discrimination, and actively seek social justice and reparation. This marginalization could be created by attitudinal, historic, social, and environmental barriers based on characteristics that are not limited to sex, age, ethnicity, disability, economic status, gender, gender expression, nationality, race, sexual orientation, and creed.83

Gendered: Characterized or determined by issues or factors of gender.84

Gender-Based Violence (GBV): GBV refers to any sexual, physical, mental, or economic violence directed towards or against someone due to their gender expression, gender identity, or perceived gender.85 It can take many forms such as emotional abuse, domestic violence, sexual harassment, and forced abortions or sterilizations.86

Gender Equality: The state of equal ease of access to resources and opportunities regardless of gender, including economic participation and decision-making; and the state of valuing different behaviors, aspirations and needs equally, regardless of gender.87

Gender Identity: An individual’s sense of self, of identifying as a woman, man, both, neither, or anywhere along the gender spectrum.88

Gender Pay Gap: Difference in average earnings of people based on gender, which is directly connected to fields of study and work, career advancement opportunities and time allocated to unpaid care.89

Institutional: Institutional forms of oppression refers to policies and practices within institutions that exclude, marginalize, and restrict certain groups or communities.90

Intersectionality: The way in which people’s lives are shaped by their multiple and overlapping identities and social locations, which, together, can produce a unique and distinct experience for that individual or group, for example, creating additional barriers, opportunities, and/or power imbalances.91 Intersectionality identifies multiple factors of advantage and disadvantage, including gender, caste, sex, race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, religion, disability, and physical appearance.92

Low Socioeconomic Status: Low income cut-off before tax measures.93

Poverty: Making an income that is insufficient in allowing individuals to purchase necessities such as food, shelter, clothing, transportation, and other essential services. Generally, poverty refers to low income as well as other dimensions of social inclusion, such as access to community participation and quality healthcare.94

Precarious Work: Employment that is poorly paid, unprotected, and insecure, which can lead to long-term in-work poverty, insecure living, and social isolation.95

Racialized: Racialization represents the social construction of race, and the processes in which societies construct racial differences and associate them with supposedly inherent characteristics or traits. Racialized individuals and groups have these constructed racial meanings attributed to them in ways that can negatively impact their economic, political, and social life.96

Reskilling: The process of learning new skills needed to do an entirely different job.97

Social Ventures: Social ventures include charities, non-profit organizations, and social enterprises.

Socioeconomic Status: The social standing or class of an individual or group that is often measured as a combination of education, income, and occupation.98

Structural Oppression: Often used synonymously with “systemic”. Structural oppression often emphasizes the role of structures (laws, policies, institutional practices, entrenched norms) within this discourse. 99

Systemic Oppression: Systemic forms of oppression are pervasively and deeply embedded within economic, political, and social systems through laws, policies, practices, and established beliefs and attitudes. Systemic oppressions reflects historical injustices that continue to be maintained and reproduced within our systems today.100

Trauma-Informed: Trauma is defined as a lasting emotional response that often results from living through a distressing event.101 Trauma-informed care refers to practices that recognize the significant impact of trauma on an individual’s physical, emotional, spiritual, and psychological state.102

Upskilling: The process of learning new skills or teaching workers new skills for their existing jobs.103

References

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2 Cotter, A. (2021, April 26). Intimate partner violence in Canada, 2018: An overview. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2021001/article/00003-eng.htm

3 Statistics Canada. (2022, January 7). Employee wages by occupation, annual. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1410034001

4 OECD. (2021, December 13). Caregiving in Crisis: Gender inequality in paid and unpaid work during COVID-19. OECD. https://www.oecd.org/coronavirus/policy-responses/caregiving-in-crisis-gender-inequality-in-paid-and-unpaid-work-duringcovid-19-3555d164/

5 Statistics Canada. (2021, September 29). Population estimates on July 1st, by age and sex. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1710000501

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7 Statistics Canada. (2018, November 28). Immigrant status and period of immigration for persons with and without disabilities aged 15 years and over, by sex, Canada. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/cv.action?pid=1310038101

8 Statistics Canada, 2016 Census of Population, Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-400-X2016211

9 Statistics Canada, 2016 Census of Population, Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-400-X2016388

10 Statistics Canada. (2022, March 23). Low income statistics by age, sex and economic family type. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/cv.action?pid=1110013501

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12 Statistics Canada, 2016 Census of Population, Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-400-X2016211

13 Statistics Canada. (2021, June 15). The Daily: A statistical portrait of Canada’s diverse LGBTQ2+ communities. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/210615/dq210615a-eng.htm

14 Statistics Canada. (2022, August 5). Labour force characteristics by province, monthly, seasonally adjusted. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1410028703

15 Johnston, R., Mohammed, A., & Van der Linden, C. (2020). Evidence of Exacerbated Gender Inequality in Child Care Obligations in Canada and Australia during the COVID-19 Pandemic. Politics & Gender, 16(4), 1131-1141. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1743923X20000574

16 RBC Economics. (2021, March 4). COVID Further Clouded the Outlook for Canadian Women at Risk of Disruption. RBC Thought Leadership. https://thoughtleadership.rbc.com/covid-further-clouded-the-outlook-for-canadian-women-at-risk-of-disruption/

17 Statistics Canada. (2022, March 23). Low income statistics by age, sex and economic family type. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/cv.action?pid=1110013501

18 Canadian Women’s Foundation. The Facts about the Gender Pay Gap. Canadian Women’s Foundation. https://canadianwomen.org/the-facts/the-gender-pay-gap/

19 Statistics Canada, 2016 Census of Population, Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-400-X2016360.

20 Statistics Canada, 2016 Census of Population, Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-400-X2016200.

21 Statistics Canada, 2016 Census of Population, Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-400-X2016360.

22 Statistics Canada, 2016 Census of Population, Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 98-400-X2016268.

23 Nath, I. (2018, February 8). For transgender women, the pay equity gap is even wider. Macleans. https://www.macleans.ca/society/for-transgender-women-the-pay-equity-gap-is-even-wider/

24 Morris, S., Fawcett, G., Brisebois, L., & Hughes, J. (2018, November 28). A demographic, employment and income profile of Canadians with disabilities aged 15 years and over, 2017. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-654-x/89-654-x2018002-eng.htm

25 Statistics Canada. (2022, March 23). Low income statistics by economic family type. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/cv.action?pid=1110013601

26 Statistics Canada. (2020, June 24). Household food insecurity, 2017/2018. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/82-625-x/2020001/article/00001-eng.htm

27 Livingston, G. (2013, July 2). The Rise of Single Fathers. Pew Research Center’s Social & Demographic Trends Project. https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2013/07/02/the-rise-of-single-fathers/

28 Schwan, K., Vaccaro, M.-E., Reid, L., Ali, N., & Baig, K. (2021, September 28). The Pan-Canadian Women’s Housing & Homelessness Survey. https://womenshomelessness.ca/wp-content/uploads/EN-Pan-Canadian-Womens-HousingHomelessness-Survey-FINAL-28-Sept-2021.pdf

29 Ibid.

30 Cotter, A. (2021, April 26). Intimate partner violence in Canada, 2018: An overview. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/85-002-x/2021001/article/00003-eng.htm

31 Wathen, C. N., MacGregor, J. C. D., MacQuarrie, B. J. with the Canadian Labour Congress. (2014). Can Work be Safe, When Home Isn’t? Initial Findings of a Pan-Canadian Survey on Domestic Violence and the Workplace. Centre for Research & Education on Violence Against Women and Children. https://www.uwo.ca/projects/heritage/heritage3/img/survey-report.pdf

32 Canadian Women’s Foundation. (2020, July). Resetting Normal: Women, Decent Work and Canada’s Fractured Care Economy. https://canadianwomen.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/ResettingNormal-Women-Decent-Work-and-Care-EN.pdf

33 Dutton, M., Kaltman, S., Goodman, L., Weinfurt, K., Vankos, N. (2005, October). Patterns of Intimate Partner Violence: Correlates and Outcomes. Violence Victims, 20(5), 483-497. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16248486/

34 Interval House. Barriers to Employability and Employment for Women Survivors of Intimate Partner Violence. http://www.intervalhouse.ca/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Barriers-Report.pdf

35 Lombard, A. Indigenous Women – Forced Sterilization. Saskatchewan, Canada. Maurice Law. https://ijrcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Fact-Sheet-Forced-Sterilization-in-Canada.pdf

36 Brennan, S. Violent Victimization of Aboriginal Women in the Canadian Provinces, 2009. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/85-002-x/2011001/article/11439-eng.htm

37 Taylor, B. (2021, May 20). 6 in 10 Indigenous women experience physical or sexual abuse: Statistics Canada. CTV News. https:// www.ctvnews.ca/canada/6-in-10-indigenous-women-experience-physical-or-sexual-abuse-statistics-canada-1.5435599

38 World Economic Forum. (2021, March). Global Gender Gap Report 2021. https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_GGGR_2021.pdf

39 Robson, K., Brown, R., & Anisef, P. (2015). Identifying the Complexity of Barriers Faced by Marginalized Youth in Transition to Postsecondary Education in Ontario.

https://gatewaycities.mcmaster.ca/publications/publication-documents/robson-brown-ansifef-2015.pdf

40 Arriagada, P. (2021, October 20). The achievements, experiences and labour market outcomes of First Nations, Métis and Inuit women with bachelor’s degrees or higher. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada.

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/75-006-x/2021001/article/00009-eng.htm

41 Balash, T. (2017). Economic Security of Women in Canada. First Nations Women’s Council on Economic Security.

https://www.ourcommons.ca/Content/Committee/421/FEWO/Brief/BR9072174/br-external/FirstNationsWomensCouncil-e.pdf

42 House of Commons. (2018, June). Report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women.

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43 Statistics Canada. (2017, February 2). Presentation to the House of Commons Standing Committee on the Status of Women: Economic Security of Women in Canada.

https://www.ourcommons.ca/Content/Committee/421/FEWO/Brief/BR8745318/br-external/StatCan2017-02-02-e.pdf

44 House of Commons. (2018, June). Report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women.

https://www.ourcommons.ca/Content/Committee/421/FEWO/Reports/RP9974529/feworp12/feworp12-e.pdf

45 Wall, K. (2019, May 2). Persistence and representation of women in STEM programs. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/75-006-x/2019001/article/00006-eng.htm

46 Wall, K. (2019, May 2). Persistence and representation of women in STEM programs. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/75-006-x/2019001/article/00006-eng.htm#n10-refa

47 Moyser, M., & Burlock, A. (2018, July 30). Time use: Total work burden, unpaid work, and leisure. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-503-x/2015001/article/54931-eng.htm

48 Plan International Canada. (2020, March 2). A women’s place in Canada is in the kitchen? Plan Canada. https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/a-woman-s-place-in-canada-is-in-the-kitchen--850577384.html

49 Macdonald, D. (2018, June). Child Care Deserts in Canada. Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. https://policyalternatives.ca/sites/default/files/uploads/publications/National%20Office/2018/06/Child%20Care%20Deserts.pdf

50 Ibid.

51 Canadian Women’s Foundation. The Mother Rising. Canadian Women’s Foundation. https://canadianwomen.org/the-mother-rising/

52 House of Commons. (2018, June). Report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women. https://www.ourcommons.ca/Content/Committee/421/FEWO/Reports/RP9974529/feworp12/feworp12-e.pdf

53 Institute for Work & Health. (2019, April 11). Women’s work more likely than men’s to be disrupted due to caring for older relatives. Institute for Work & Health. https://www.iwh.on.ca/newsletters/at-work/96/womens-work-more-likely-than-mens-to-bedisrupted-due-to-caring-for-older-relatives

54 Gibbard, R. (2017, November). Sizing Up the Challenge. Meeting the Demand for Long-Term Care in Canada. The Conference Board of Canada. https://www.cma.ca/sites/default/files/2018-11/9228_Meeting%20the%20Demand%20for%20Long-Term%20 Care%20Beds_RPT.pdf

55 Kaul, R. (2019, October 22). Career Break – Challenges & The Return Journey. LinkedIn. https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/career-break-challenges-return-journey-rupali-kaul

56 Hewlett, S.A., & Luce, C.B. (2005, March) Off-Ramps and On-Ramps: Keeping Talented Women on the Road to Success. Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/2005/03/off-ramps-and-on-ramps-keeping-talented-women-on-the-road-to-success

57 OECD. (2018). Bridging the Digital Gender Divide: Include, Upskill, Innovate. https://www.oecd.org/digital/bridging-the-digital-gender-divide.pdf

58 Stanford, J. (2020, November). The Role of Early Learning and Child Care in Rebuilding Canada’s Economy after COVID-19. Centre for Future Work. https://centreforfuturework.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/ELCC-Report-Formatted-FINAL-FINAL.pdf

59 Canadian Standards Association & Bureau de normalisation du Québec. (2013, January). Psychological health and safety in the workplace — Prevention, promotion, and guidance to staged implementation.

60 Work Rights Centre. (2022). What is Precarious Work?. Work Rights Centre. https://www.workrightscentre.org/what-is-precarious-work

61 Canadian Women’s Foundation. (2020, July). Resetting Normal: Women, Decent Work and Canada’s Fractured Care Economy. https://canadianwomen.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/ResettingNormal-Women-Decent-Work-and-Care-EN.pdf

62 Canadian Women’s Foundation. The Facts about the Gender Pay Gap. Canadian Women’s Foundation. https://canadianwomen.org/the-facts/the-gender-pay-gap/

63 Devillard, S., Vogel, T., Pickersgill, A., Madgavkar, A., Nowski, T., Krishnan, M., Pan, T., & Kechrid, D. (2017, June). The Power of Parity: Advancing Women’s Equality in Canada. McKinsey & Company.

https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/gender-equality/the-power-of-parity-advancing-womens-equality-in-canada

64 Dengate, J., Hoffart, R., Peter, T., Farenhorst, A., & Franz-Odendaal, T. (2021). The Effect of Women Academic Leaders on Canadian Natural Sciences and Engineering Professors. Canadian Journal of Higher Education, 51(2), 1–14. https://doi.org/10.47678/cjhe.vi0.188941

65 Statistics Canada. (2021, November 8). Representation of women and men elected to national Parliament and of ministers appointed to federal Cabinet. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/cv.action?pid=1010013701

66 McKinsey & Company. (2021). Women in the Workplace. https://wiw-report.s3.amazonaws.com/Women_in_the_Workplace_2021.pdf

67 Randall, S. (2021, September 24). Which countries have the largest share of female investors?. Wealth Professional. https://www.wealthprofessional.ca/news/industry-news/which-countries-have-the-largest-share-of-female-investors/360127

68 Ibid.

69 Statistics Canada. (2021, April 13). The Daily: Gender Results Framework: Data table on the representation of men and women in First Nations band councils and Chiefs in First Nations communities in Canada, 2019. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quotidien/210413/dq210413f-eng.htm

70 Statistics Canada. (2021, March 30). Representation of men and women on boards of directors. Government of Canada, Statistics Canada. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/cv.action?pid=3310021801

71 Unnikrishnan, S., & Blair, C. (2019, July 30). Want to Boost the Global Economy by $5 Trillion? Support Women as Entrepreneurs. Boston Consulting Group. https://www.bcg.com/publications/2019/boost-global-economy-5-trillion-dollar-support-women-entrepreneurs

72 Cukier, W., Mo, G.Y., Chavoushi, Z.H., Blanchette, S., & Noshiravani, R. (2021). The State of Women’s Entrepreneurship in Canada. Women Entrepreneurship Knowledge Hub. https://wekh.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/WEKH_State_of_Womens_Entrepreneurship_in_Canada_2021.pdf

73 Silva, P. (2020, November 30). 3 Ways New Entrepreneurs Stand To Benefit From Working With A Mentor. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/piasilva/2020/11/30/3-ways-new-entrepreneurs-stand-to-benefit-from-working-with-a-mentor

74 Canadian Women’s Chamber of Commerce & Dream Legacy Foundation. (2020, May). Falling Through The Cracks. https://canwcc.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Falling-through-the-Cracks_CanWCC_May2020v19.pdf

75 Weisul, K. (2018, December 20). Report: Female Entrepreneurs Much More Likely To Employ Women. Inc.com. https://www.inc.com/kimberly-weisul/these-entrepreneurs-hired-very-few-men.html

76 Ontario Chamber of Commerce. (2021, May 26). Entrepreneurial Success Can Drive Canada’s Economic Recovery if Given a Chance | OCC. (2021, May 26). Ontario Chamber of Commerce. https://occ.ca/mediareleases/entrepreneurial-success-can-drive-canadas-economic-recovery-if-given-a-chance/

77 European Institute for Gender Equality. Care work. European Institute for Gender Equality. https://eige.europa.eu/thesaurus/terms/1059

78 Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. (2005, November 24). Economic and Social Council. United Nations. http://docstore.ohchr.org/SelfServices/FilesHandler.ashx?enc=4slQ6QSmlBEDzFEovLCuW1a0Szab0oXTdImnsJZZVQfUKxXVisd7Dae%2FCu%2B13J25Nha7l9NlwYZ%2FTmK57O%2FSr7TB2hbCAidyVu5x7XcqjNXn44LZ52C%2BIkX8AGQrVyIc

79 International Labour Organization. Decent work. International Labour Organization. https://www.ilo.org/global/topics/decent-work/lang--en/index.htm

80 European Institute for Gender Equality. Domestic violence. European Institute for Gender Equality. https://eige.europa.eu/thesaurus/terms/1089

81 Anova. Domestic Violence. Anova Future. https://www.anovafuture.org/education-advocacy/abuse-domestic-violence

82 Longley, R. (2022, February 3). Equity vs. Equality: What Is the Difference?. ThoughtCo. https://www.thoughtco.com/equity-vs-equality-4767021

83 Canadian Kinesiology Alliance. Inclusion Statement Canadian Kinesiology Alliance. https://www.cka.ca/en/cka-inclusion

84 European Institute for Gender Equality. Gendering. European Institute for Gender Equality. https://eige.europa.eu/thesaurus/terms/1183

85 Royal Canadian Mounted Police. (2021, November 15). Gender-based violence. Government of Canada, Royal Canadian Mounted Police. https://www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/en/relationship-violence/gender-based-violence

86 UNHCR: United Nations Refugee Agency. Gender-based Violence. UNHCR. https://www.unhcr.org/gender-based-violence.html

87 UNICEF. Promoting Gender Equality: An Equity-Focused Approach To Programming. UNICEF. https://pdf4pro.com/view/promoting-gender-equality-an-equity-focused-approach-59ab86.html

88 Ontario Human Rights Commission. Gender identity and gender expression. Ontario Human Rights Commission. https://www.ohrc.on.ca/en/policy-preventing-discrimination-because-gender-identity-and-gender-expression/3-genderidentity-and-gender-expression

89 Canadian Women’s Foundation. The Facts about the Gender Pay Gap. Canadian Women’s Foundation. https://canadianwomen.org/the-facts/the-gender-pay-gap/

90 The Aspen Institute. (2016, July 11). 11 Terms You Should Know to Better Understand Structural Racism. The Aspen Institute. https://www.aspeninstitute.org/blog-posts/structural-racism-definition/

91 Government of Ontario, Anti-Racism Directorate. (2021, November 4). Glossary. Government of Ontario. https://www.ontario.ca/document/data-standards-identification-and-monitoring-systemic-racism/glossary

92 Runyan, A.S. (2018, November). What Is Intersectionality and Why Is It Important?. American Association of University Professors. https://www.aaup.org/article/what-intersectionality-and-why-it-important

93 Statistics Canada. (2015). Low income cut-offs https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/75f0002m/2012002/lico-sfr-eng.htm

94 Government of Nova Scotia. (2008, May). How is poverty measured in Canada?. Government of Nova Scotia. https://novascotia.ca/coms/department/backgrounders/poverty/Poverty_Stats-May2008.pdf

95 Work Rights Centre. (2022). What is Precarious Work?. Work Rights Centre.

96 Government of Ontario, Anti-Racism Directorate. (2021, November 4). Glossary. Government of Ontario. https://www.ontario.ca/document/data-standards-identification-and-monitoring-systemic-racism/glossary

97 Hastings, R. (2022, January 5). What Is Reskilling? Why Is It So Important for Today’s Workforce? Emeritus. https://emeritus.org/blog/what-is-reskilling-definition

98 American Psychological Association. Socioeconomic Status. American Psychological Association. https://www.apa.org/topics/socioeconomic-status

99 Braveman, P.A., Arkin E., Proctor, D., Kauh, T., & Holm, N. (2022). Systemic And Structural Racism: Definitions, Examples, Health Damages, And Approaches To Dismantling. Health Affairs Journal, 41(2), 171-178. https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2021.01394

100 Ibid.

101 Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. Mental Illness & Addiction Index: Trauma. Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. https://www.camh.ca/en/health-info/mental-illness-and-addiction-index/trauma

102 BC Mental Health & Substance Use Services. Trauma-Informed Practice. BC Mental Health & Substance Use Services. http://www.bcmhsus.ca/health-professionals/clinical-professional-resources/trauma-informed-practice

103 Talent Guard. Reskilling and Upskilling: A Strategic Response to Changing Skill Demands. Talent Guard. https://www.talentguard.com/blog/reskilling-upskilling-strategic-response-changing-skill-demands