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The Double X Economy

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Member Reviews

One of those books that makes you think but also makes you angry.
Here's hoping that things will change & not just for women but all underrepresented people.

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I firmly believe that everyone should read The Double X Economy... NO BOOK has sparked such anger and determination in me, so much so that several of my female reader friends preordered the book based purely on seeing my reaction to it whilst reading. As a reader of mostly fiction, I found the Double X Economy easy to read, well structured and argued and with a genuinely perfect balance of both personal experiences and scientific data to support the information within. I found this so valuable to understand, especially in the current world, that we still have so much work to do for gender equality and this is the exact perfect resource to understand why.

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The Double X Economy is a leading thinker's groundbreaking examination of women's economic empowerment and although it is pretty dense and full of fascinating research, I thoroughly enjoyed it, but if you're after a light read this is not it as you need to be fully engaged the whole time in order to get the most out of it.

Linda Scott coined the phrase “Double X Economy” to address the systemic exclusion of women from the world financial order. In The Double X Economy, Scott argues on the strength of hard data and on-the-ground experience that removing those barriers to women’s success is a win for everyone, regardless of gender. Scott opens our eyes to the myriad economic injustices that constrain women throughout the world: fathers buying and selling daughters against their will; husbands burning brides whose dowries have been spent; men appropriating women’s earnings and widows’ land; banks discriminating against women applying for loans; corporations paying women less than men; men treating women as their intellectual inferiors due to primitive notions of female brain development; governments depriving women of affordable childcare; and so much more.

As Scott takes us from the streets of Accra, where sex trafficking is widespread, to American business schools, where women are routinely patronised, the pervasiveness of the Double X Economy becomes glaringly obvious. But Scott believes that this rampant problem can be solved. She proposes concrete actions and urges her readers to rise up and join the global movement for women’s economic empowerment that is gaining momentum by the day.

This is an important and accessible read if you are willing to put the time in; the research is comprehensive and utterly shocking and there were a plethora of times where I felt my blood boiling. There were also times I became emotional at the discrimination faced by woman all over the world. As an egalitarian, I believe in equality for all so this was the perfect book to fire me up and if you're interested in the topic of equality or feminism then I implore you to pick this up. It's a tough but necessary read. It’s high time women were treated as equals and not made to feel inferior as they currently are. Many thanks to Faber & Faber for an ARC.

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The book taught me to be thankful for what I have in life in the first place. Although I am coming from a background where I had to work hard to achieve what I have, still many women do not make it and this is heartbreaking. The author has done a Great job in describing the Double C economy ruled by men. In some countries situations are extremely frustrating and in some also quite upsetting however at a different level. Worth reading.

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