Why Is the Spanish Hotel Trade Lagging So Far Behind in Gender Equality? A Sustainability Question

There are far more women than men who hold higher qualifications in tourism, but nevertheless, inequalities still prevail on executive committees in the tourism industry. Society nowadays is aware that gender inequality in terms of women’s rights and opportunities has always existed. Such problems are reflected in religious doctrines, cultural habits, and outdated ways of thinking in which women are viewed as being first and foremost careers. This attitude is also reflected in the workplace. Methodology: Hakim’s (1992) methodology has been used to classify occupations, and female-dominated, male-dominated and integrated occupations can be used, studying data published by the most important hotel chains in Spain. Objectives: since women joined the labor market, females have been employed in significant numbers in the tourism sector. The objective of this work is to study in depth what number of women are in the boardrooms of large hotel chains in Spain, collecting data from the top five hotel chains, as this important phenomenon must be researched. The most salient results are: a high number of women work in the hotels subsector and gender equality has not yet been achieved at higher echelons, since senior management positions are dominated by males. Hence, the aim of this paper is, having carried out a thorough and extensive evaluation, to empirically determine the state of play for females in this industry today and to put forward further improvements which women, the government, hotels and society should jointly strive to achieve. In the conclusion, the initial hypothesis is confirmed.