Unfortunately womens rights have not progressed very fast due to prejudices against women that are so rooted, making any further progress difficult.
Traditions are difficult to break, as it is not easy to change decades of ways of life that have been respected and practiced for centuries, thus stalling the progress of womens rights. However, all battles start step by step and there have been some positive changes regarding to equality in work areas, including an increase in women posts in areas where males were dominating the workplaces.
Countries such as India and South Africa have always been predominately male centered and these are areas where international womens rights have difficulty imposing their needs and wishes. It must be said that now, women in these countries have easier access to loans, hence rendering their lives and employment management easier than it was before.
In Kuwait women were allowed to vote during a brief period, thus putting a great pressure on the neighboring Middle Eastern countries who do not allow their women to vote, as they are considered second class citizens. Although there is still a lot to be done as far as the right of vote is concerned, womens rights have come a long way and womens suffrage is gaining terrain.
However, the gender wage gap is unfortunately still very noticeable, for although countries have promised to implement the necessary actions they still have not. Women who live in these areas are still receiving wages that are below what they should be getting.
In some societies, violence against women has even escalated and sometimes takes place in public. When their respective governments are questioned or asked to stop these practices, they justify the violence as a component of their religion, culture, or tradition.
Even in the United States, the average woman who works as an average employee is paid 25 percent less than her male counterpart. When a survey was conducted asking people what they thought was a good pay for women working the same job as a man, almost all respondents believed that that 80 cents on a man's dollar was a good figure for a woman doing the same job.
In third world countries, women do almost half of the farming and harvesting of crops. They also maintain grocery shops along with running the household alone. These women still get paid significantly less when compared to men who perform the same job.
Women cannot possibly raise their standards of living due to this diminished pay and are therefore obliged to depend on men for most of their needs, putting them in a vulnerable position. Most governments still need to realize that the same type of work can be done by women and men alike without discrimination.