Women strike to highlight inequality in most gender equal society

The prime minister of Iceland has joined other women in the country on a strike to call attention to the remaining inequalities in their society even though the country ranks highest globally in terms of gender parity.

The protest, in which women were encouraged to stop working for a full day, was intended to highlight challenges including a gender pay gap, the uneven burden of unpaid work within the home and violence that still afflicts women disproportionately.

The day has echoes back to 1975, when 90% of the island’s female workforce first walked out of their jobs and handed children to their fathers for an eye-opening demonstration of the importance of their work, both paid and unpaid.