What’s the cost when women are left out of healthcare, education, and public policy data?

Data drives decision making in critical areas. Yet, in most cases, as Caroline Criado Perez, author of the book, Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men, points out, women are simply absent from the data.

Why is this? Because we operate in a world where deeply ingrained cultural biases treat men as the data default and women as the exception. Caroline explains, “If we look at politics . . . news media . . . films, women represent about 20 percent of the people we see and hear about. . . we are taking in that information and thinking that this is what the world looks like. . . it creates this sense in our heads that we don’t have to collect data on women.”

This data gap leads to bad decisions with devastating consequences. What’s even more shocking is that these gaps are hidden in plain sight, in places where it would seem like gender couldn’t possibly matter.

For example, when one Swedish town studied which roads got cleared first following a snowstorm, they were surprised to learn their decisions were based on male commuting patterns. The result was that women were getting hurt, and the town was losing money. Caroline reveals that . . . “the cost of the accident and emergency admission was three times the cost of the winter road maintenance. And just by doing this simple switch of the order in which they do the snow clearing, that cost went down dramatically.”

Caroline Criado Perez is a writer, broadcaster, and feminist activist and was named Liberty Human Rights Campaigner of the Year. Her first book was titled, Do It Like a Woman.

The Host

You can learn more about Curious Minds Host and Creator, Gayle Allen, and Producer, Rob Mancabelli, by visiting @CuriousGayle and www.gayleallen.net.

Episode Links

Pierre Bourdieu

Why Sweden Clears Snow-Covered Walkways Before Roads by Angie Schmitt

The Work that Makes Work Possible by Anne-Marie Slaughter

Women Lack Access to Private Toilets Around the World

CM 138: Caroline Criado Perez on Invisible Women

Curious Minds at Work

CM 138: Caroline Criado Perez on Invisible Women