Bulgarian Women More Often Unemployed, Paid Less

Women in Bulgaria make less money than men, and are a greater share of the unemployed. Photo by BGNES

About 57% of the people who are registered as unemployed in Bulgaria are women, according to Daniela Madzharova from the Regional Employment Service in Sofia.

According to the data presented by her during a round table on gender equality, the share of women of the total number of unemployed was even higher in 2008 – 60%.

Madzharova said the Bulgarian women were more willing to take qualification courses, or to start lower paying jobs, or jobs that did not correspond to their education.

Even though Bulgaria’s current 41st Parliament is chaired by a woman, Tsetska Tsacheva, only 22% of the 240 MPs are women, reminded Stanimira Hadzhimitova from the Gender Foundation.

She pointed out the greatest number of women MPs was in the 39th Parliament (2001-2005).

Six of Bulgaria’s 17 Parliamentary Committees are chaired by women, but their share of the total number of Committee members does not exceed 35%. Four of the Committees – including the Committee on Fighting Corruption, and the Committee for Controlling the State National Security Agency DANS – have no women members whatsoever.

Professor Katya Vladimirova from the University of National and World Economy in Sofia has pointed out that women still got paid significantly less than men in Bulgaria.

A project of the Labor Ministry found that in 2007 the average monthly salary of men working in the financial mediation sector was BGN 1 170, whereas women got only BGN 858. Similar differences have been discovered in the industry and health care sectors.

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