page_title: Women in Iceland
section_title: Vigdís Finnbogadóttir 
hierarchical_section_title: Women in Iceland / Government / Vigdís Finnbogadóttir 
caption_attribution_description: Nederlands: Bezoek president IJsland, mevrouw Vigdis Finnbogadottir inspecteert met Koningin Beatrix erewacht op Rotterdam Airport 19 september 1985
context_page_description: Women in Iceland generally enjoy good gender equality. As of 2018, 88% of working-age women are employed, 65% of students attending university are female, and 41% of members of parliament are women. Nevertheless, women still earn about 14% less than men, though these statistics do not take into account the hours worked, over-time and choices of employment. Iceland has the world's highest proportion of women in the labour market, significant child care allocations for working women, and three months' parental leave for both men and women.
  Iceland is arguably one of the world's most feminist countries, having been awarded this status in 2011 for the second year in a row. Iceland was the first country to have a female president, Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, elected in 1980. It also has the world's first female and openly gay head of government, Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir, who was elected prime minister in 2009.
  Iceland enjoys the smallest overall gender gap, according to the World Economic Forum ranking Global Gender Gap Report, a position it has held since 2009.
context_section_description: On June 29, 1980 Vigdís Finnbogadóttir was voted in as the first female president of Iceland, and the fourth president of the republic. She was the first woman to be elected head of state in a national election, and the world's first democratically elected female president. After becoming president without opposition in 1984, 1988, and 1992, she retired from the presidency in 1996. Vigdis also was an artistic Director of the Reykjavík Theatre Company, she was a teacher of French at the University of Iceland, and was the press officer at the National Theatre of Iceland (1954-1957 and 1961-1964). She broadcast lectures on local television, and trained local tour guides.
  During her time as president she used her position to focus on youth and to support forestry, while promoting Icelandic language and culture. After her retirement as president in 1996, Vigdis went on to become "founding chair of the Council of Women World Leaders at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University". Two years later, in 1998, she was appointed president of the Unesco World Commission on the Ethics of Scientific Knowledge and Technology.
caption: Vigdís Finnbogadóttir
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "Bezoek president IJsland, mevrouw Vigdis Finnbogadottir inspecteert met Koningin Beatrix erewacht op Rotterdam Airport \n*19 september 1985", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "96", "Image YResolution": "96", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS2 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2013:09:06 12:19:54", "Image Artist": "Rob C. Croes / Anefo", "Image Copyright": "http://proxy.handle.net/10648/ad4a9268-d0b4-102d-bcf8-003048976d84", "Image ExifOffset": "428", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "566", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "4627", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "761", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1014"}