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Sexism, also known as gender discrimination or sex discrimination, is the belief that a characteristic inherent in one's sex necessarily adversely affects one's ability, even though that characteristic does not necessarily have that effect. The belief is generally false regarding the people who are so judged. However, when the adverse effect necessarily is a consequence of a difference between sexes, it is generally not sexist to identify or act on that relationship. Whether a particular effect does or does not necessarily follow a particular sex difference is a subject of analysis in various fields of scholarship and many scholarly findings have changed over the years. Sexism is a form of discrimination or devaluation based on a person's sex, with such attitudes being based on beliefs in traditional stereotypes of gender roles. The term sexism is most often used in relation to discrimination against women, in the context of patriarchy. Sexism involves hatred of, or prejudice towards, a gender as a whole or the application of gender stereotypes. Sexism is often associated with gender supremacy arguments.

sex female male intersex transsex

hatred misogyny misandry misandrogyny cissexism

fears gynophobia androphobia androgynophobia transphobia

anti-discriminatory feminism men's rights/feminism LGBTIQ LGBT

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Cultural stereotypes are engrained in both men and women and these stereotypes are a possible explanation for gender inequality and the resulting gendered wage disparity. Women have traditionally been viewed as being caring and nurturing and are designated to occupations which require such skills. While these skills are culturally valued, they were typically associated with domesticity, so occupations requiring these same skills are not economically valued. Men have traditionally been viewed as the breadwinner or the worker, so jobs held by men have been historically economically valued and occupations predominated by men continue to be economically valued and pay higher wages.

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Empirical studies have found widely shared cultural beliefs that men are more socially valued and more competent than women at most things, as well as specific assumptions that men are better at some particular tasks (e.g., mechanical tasks) while women are better at others (e.g., nurturing tasks). Gender stereotypes can facilitate and impede intellectual performance. For instance, stereotype threats can lower women's performance on mathematics tests due to the stereotype that women have inferior quantitative skills compared to men's. Stereotypes can also affect the assessments people make of their own competence. These "biased self-assessments" have far-reaching effects because they can shape men and womens educational and career decisions.

Occupational sexism refers to any discriminatory practices, statements, actions, etc. based on a person's sex that are present or occur in a place of employment. One form of occupational sexism is wage discrimination. In 2008, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) found that while female employment rates have expanded considerably and the gender employment and wage gaps have narrowed virtually everywhere, women still have 20% less chance to have a job than men on average and they are paid 17% less. The report also found that despite the fact that almost all OECD countries, including the U.S., have established antidiscrimination laws, these laws are difficult to enforce.

The glass ceiling effect is also considered a possible contributor to the gender wage gap or income disparity. This effect suggests that gender provides significant disadvantages towards the top of job hierarchies which become worse as a persons career goes on. The term glass ceiling implies that invisible or artificial barriers exist which prevent women from advancing within their jobs or receiving promotions. These barriers exist in spite of the achievements or qualifications of the women and still exist when other characteristics that are job-relevant such as experience, education, and abilities are controlled for. The glass ceiling effect also indicates the limited chances of women for income raises and promotion or advancement to more prestigious positions or jobs. As women are prevented by these artificial barriers from receiving job promotions or income raises, the effects of the inequality of the glass ceiling increase over the course of a womans career.

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A 2009 study conducted by David R. Hekman and colleagues found that customers who viewed videos featuring a female and a male actor playing the role of an employee helping a customer were 19 percent more satisfied with the male employee's performance, suggesting customer bias as a reason why men continue to earn 25 percent more than equally-well performing women. In a second study, they found that male doctors were rated as more approachable and competent than equally-well performing women. They interpret their findings to suggest that employers are willing to pay more for male employees because employers are customer driven and customers are happier with male employees. They also suggest that what is required to solve the problem of wage inequality is to change customer biases, not necessarily to pay women more.

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Women in the past have generally been disadvantaged from higher education. When women were admitted to higher education they were encouraged to major in subjects that were considered less intellectual; the study of English literature in American and British colleges and universities was in fact instituted as a field of study considered suitable to women's "lesser intellects". Since 1991, however, the proportion of young women enrolled in college in the U.S. has exceeded the enrollment rate for young men, and the gap has widened over time. Women now make up the majority54% of the 10.8 million young adults enrolled in college in the U.S. Research studies have found that discrimination continues today: boys receive more attention and praise in the classroom in grade school along with more blame and punishment, and "this pattern of more active teacher attention directed at male students continues at the postsecondary level". Over time, female students speak less and less in classroom settings.

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Sex-selective abortion is the practice of terminating a pregnancy based upon the predicted gender of the baby. The selective abortion of female fetuses is most common in areas where cultural norms value male children over female children, especially in parts of People's Republic of China, India, Pakistan, Korea, Taiwan, and the Caucasus. A son is often preferred as an "asset" since he can earn and support the family; a daughter is a "liability" since she will be married off to another family, and so will not contribute financially to her parents. The patriarchal structure of a society is the single most important factor skewing the sex ratio in favor of males, accentuated in some cultures by the burden of raising a dowry for a daughter's marriage. Openness to the very concept of sex selection is a significant factor: among societies which practice selective female abortion nowadays, many were systematically practicing female infanticide (either directly or by withholding postnatal care from children of undesirable sex) long before abortion became a viable option.

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Despite the increase in women in the labor force since the mid1900s, women are still responsible for the majority of the domestic chores and childcare. While women are splitting their time between work and care of the home, men are pressured into being the primary economic supporter of the home. Despite the fact that different households may divide chores more evenly, there is evidence that supports that women have retained the primary caregiver role within familial life despite contributions economically. This evidence suggest that women who work outside the home often put an extra 18 hours a week doing household or childcare related chores as opposed to men who average 12 minutes a day in childcare activities. In addition to a lack of interest in the home on the part of some men, some women may bar men from equal participation in the home which may contribute to this disparity.

Some men's rights writers say that marriage is unfavorable to men, particularly the financial consequences of divorce. Father's rights advocates claim that there is a continuing societal bias favoring women as custodial parents in the face of "no-fault" divorce laws and is unjust to men when marriages fail. Some claim that this leads to men avoiding marriage, calling it a "marriage strike.

Selling a wife, largely historical, is a sexist custom. Wife selling was the practice of a husband selling his wife, in some cases to a new husband. The English custom of wife selling largely began in the late 17th century when divorce was a practical impossibility for all but the very wealthiest. At least one early 19th-century magistrate is on record as stating that he did not believe he had the right to prevent wife sales, and there were cases of local Poor Law Commissioners forcing husbands to sell their wives, rather than having to maintain the family in workhouses. At that time, two types of wife selling were recognized, both considered illegal. The first type was when a husband sold his wife to a man with whom she had been committing adultery. The second type was when a husband sold his wife because she had betrayed him or because they were no longer able to get along. During the Ming Dynasty, it was gradually established that only wife selling which was motivated by adultery should be punished.

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Gender inequality and discrimination is argued to cause and perpetuate poverty and vulnerability in society as a whole. Household and intra-household knowledge and resources are key influences in individuals' abilities to take advantage of external livelihood opportunities or respond appropriately to threats. Despite acknowledgement by institutions such as the World Bank that gender inequality is bad for economic growth, there are many difficulties in creating a comprehensive response. It is argued that the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) fail to acknowledge gender inequality as a cross-cutting issue. Gender is mentioned in MDG3 and MDG5: MDG3 measures gender parity in education, the share of women in wage employment and the proportion women in national legislatures. MDG5 focuses on maternal mortality and on universal access to reproductive health. However, even these targets are significantly off-track.