Canada doesn’t have a sexism/racism problem

International Women’s Day is a good reminder of how far we still have to go toward gender equality.

Women represent just 11 per cent of board members on companies listed on the S&P/TSX composite index, which represents large publicly traded Canadian companies.

Among the TSX-composite-listed companies, 42 per cent have no women on the boards of directors, while 28 per cent had just one female board member.

While we’re doing marginally better than the United States, even the Nordic countries still lack gender parity on their corporate boards. Norway leads with 36%, Finland and Sweden each have 26%.

Meanwhile, the past decade has been increasingly harsh toward aboriginals, who make up an increasing proportion of our prison population.

The correctional investigator pointed to what he called "alarming" statistics.

"There are just over 3,400 aboriginal men and women making up 23 per cent of the country’s federal prison inmate population," Sapers said.

"In other words, while aboriginal people in Canada comprise just four per cent of the population, in federal prisons nearly one in four is Métis, Inuit, or First Nations."

Sapers found almost 40 per cent increase in the aboriginal incarcerated population between 2001-02 and 2010-11.

I guess I don’t really have any good news here. Also, this weekend is an hour shorter.