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Six hundred million women are trapped in insecure jobs without legal protection, according to a sweeping report by UN Women.

“Despite widespread guarantees of equality, the reality for many millions of women is that justice remains out of reach,” UN Women Executive Director Michelle Bachelet said. “The report highlights the practical barriers that women – particularly the poorest and most excluded –face in negotiating justice systems and the innovative approaches that governments and civil society are pioneering to overcome them.”

“Progress of the World’s Women: In Pursuit of Justice” is a comprehensive survey of the barriers facing women around the world.  View the report at UNWomen.org.

“In rich and poor countries alike, the infrastructure of justice – the police, the courts and the judiciary – is failing women, which manifests itself in poor services and hostile attitudes from the very people whose duty it is to fulfill women’s rights,” the report says. “As a result, although equality between women and men is guaranteed in the constitutions of 139 countries and territories, inadequate laws and loopholes in legislative frameworks, poor enforcement and vast implementation gaps make these guarantees hollow promises, having little impact on the day-to-day lives of women.

“In 48 countries, there are limitations on the industries in which women can work,” the report continues. “The most common restrictions are on jobs that involve heavy lifting or arduous work; jobs that threaten a woman’s mental and physical health; and work in mines, quarries or underground. In 11 countries, female employment is restricted in jobs that are ‘against women’s morals’.”

Globally, 53 percent of working women are employed in vulnerable jobs, as own-account workers or as unpaid workers in family businesses or farms. In South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, more than 80 percent of women workers are in this kind of employment. Millions work in the informal economy as home-based workers and paid domestic workers.