There is one other important set of observations to make about the literacy statistics. It concerns gender differences. There is very little difference between the sexes in educational attainment; in 1986, 16.9% of men, and 17.6% of women, had fewer than nine years of schooling. The reading levels of the sexes as measured in the Statistics Canada survey are also very similar; 15% of females and 14% of males are at levels 1 and 2 — excluding those who report no skills in either official language. (There are, however, significant differences when immigration is related to gender; while 12% of Canadian-born males and 24% of foreign-born males are at levels 1 and 2, the rates for Canadian-born and foreign-born females are 11% and 32%).¹²

A more striking difference between men and women overall concerns not differences in literacy rates per se, but differences in the economic consequences of limited literacy. Income levels and employment-population ratios for women with fewer than nine years of schooling are only about half of men's.¹³ In general, the extent of women's economic disadvantage relative to men increases as education levels decrease. These statistics reflect a complex variety of patterns in women's lives. Some women leave school when they become pregnant, and are then confined to welfare or low-paid jobs. Women in the labour force have often required a higher level of schooling than men, given the generally higher educational requirements for clerical and health care occupations traditionally dominated by working class women, in comparison with the resource or manufacturing occupations traditionally dominated by working class men.¹⁴

All these statistics show in an abstract way what is concretely and profoundly visible in literacy programs. Many students and potential students are immigrants (often long-term immigrants who have oral but not literate skills in English or French), and literacy work often overlaps with teaching English or French as a second language. Many are aboriginal. Many are francophone. Many have disabilities. Literacy work often involves working with the poor, and women with limited literacy are especially likely to be poor.