State of Gender Equality in the Municipality of Los Baños, Laguna, Philippines

Gender equality is the absence of discrimination based on a person’s sex in opportunities, allocation of resources and benefits, or access to services. This descriptive-comparative research study aimed to determine the state of gender equality in the municipality of Los Baños, province of Laguna, Philippines, in terms of education, employment, and income. It was participated in by 385 respondents coming from the 14 barangays of the municipality. Statistical tools such as frequency counts, percentages, and weighted mean were utilized to describe the profile of respondents as well as their level of agreement on gender equality. Hypotheses were tested and analyzed with the aid of the Kruskal-Wallis H test with post hoc analysis, t-test, and Mann-Whitney U test for independent samples. The study found that the municipality of Los Baños advocates gender equality in terms of education, employment, and income as reflected in their level of agreement on gender equality with a grand mean of 3.08. A significant difference was observed in the respondents’ monthly income when grouped according to their profile such as residency, age, educational attainment, and employment status. However, there is no significant difference observed when grouped according to sex. Hence, the hypothesis is partly upheld. Moreover, a significant difference was observed in the respondents’ level of agreement on gender equality when grouped according to residency, educational attainment, and employment status. But there is no significant difference observed when grouped according to age and sex. Thus, the hypothesis is partly upheld. With these results, the residents of Los Baños, Laguna, Philippines are hereby encouraged to remain vigilant in advocating gender equality in all aspects of their lives. Keywords: state gender equality municipality of Los Baños