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Appendix 1
Economic equality indicators
The ability of women to leave violent relationships or situations where they are exposed to violence is related in part to their economic autonomy. For example, a woman in a violent relationship who is unable to afford housing on her income alone may be more inclined to remain with an abusive partner. While there are no recent national data on women’s homelessness, in Toronto between 1988 and 1996 the percentage of single-parent families (most headed by women) using the emergency hostel system increased from 24% to 37%. They entered the hostel system at twice the rate of two-parent families (Golden et al. 1999). The number of shelters that provided this type of service increased during this same time period.
Indeed, economic inequality, which is higher for some groups of women, presents a barrier to ending violence against women. In 2003, the average earned income for Canadian women was about $24,800, compared with $39,100 for men. Overall that year, the average income for employed women was about 64% that for men. Just as vulnerability to violence may be a result of a woman’s economic situation, for many, exposure to violence in previous relationships places them in situations of economic hardship. Studies indicate that 68% of all single mothers reported experiencing violence in previous marriages or common-law unions (Violence Against Women Survey 1993). Moreover, lone-parent families headed by women have by far the lowest incomes of all family types. In 2003, 38% of all families headed by lone-parent mothers had incomes that fell below the low income cut-off (LICO). In comparison, just 7% of non-elderly two-parent families with children, and 13% of male lone-parent families had low incomes that year (Statistics Canada 2006).
A large percentage of Aboriginal women have low incomes. In 2000, for example, 36% of Aboriginal women aged 15 and over had incomes below the LICO, compared with 32% of Aboriginal men and 17% of non-Aboriginal women. Moreover, in that same year, 73% of Aboriginal women who were lone parents lived below the LICO (Statistics Canada 2006).
Immigrant women, particularly recent immigrants, tend to have low incomes despite their usually higher levels of education than Canadian-born women. In 2000, the average income of immigrant women aged 15 and over was just 64% of that of their male counterparts. Close to one in five women living in Canada described themselves as an immigrant in 2001, some 2.6 million or 18% of the total female population.
A similar pattern exists for visible minority women, who have higher rates of completed university education than other women. However, in 2000, the average total incomes for visible minority women aged 15 years and over was $20,000, more than $3,000 less than the figure for non-visible minority women in Canada ($23,300). In 2001, about one in ten women in Canada identified themselves as members of a visible minority community, some 1.6 million or 11% of the total female population (Statistics Canada 2006).
The following table (Table A1.1) provides an indication of the average income of men and women in Canada from 1991 to 2003. Table A1.2 also indicates the percentage of women in justice-related occupations from 1991 to 2001.
Table A1.1 Income and earnings trends
Table A1.2 Women in justice-related occupations
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