This Country Has the Most Women Inventors in Europe

A new study charted the gender gap in European inventors from 1978 to today by counting the women named in patent applications. From 2010-2019, 30.6% of Latvia’s inventors were women. Portugal took second place with 26.8%, and the third was Croatia, where 25.8% of inventors were women. The good news is the number of women inventors is growing from 2% in 1978 to 13.2% in 2019. But there’s still a long way to parity. Women account for 22% of all patents in chemistry and only 5.2% in mechanical engineering. Gender bias can be high in STEM, especially for those starting out, says the report. This reduces their chances of landing research jobs and reaching the upper echelons of companies and universities. They’re also less likely than men to be credited for patents they work on. Watch to learn more about how we close this inventor gap.