Leonora Risse

Dr Leonora Risse is an economist who specialises in gender equality. Her research focuses on gender equality, the labour market, wellbeing and disadvantage. She engages regularly with government, business and community groups to advise on gender equality issues.

Dr Risse is a Research Fellow with the Women's Leadership Institute Australia and an Expert Panel Member on gender equity for the Fair Work Commission. She has previously served as a Senior Research Economist for the Productivity Commission. She spend time in residence at Harvard University as a Research Fellow with the Women and Public Policy Program in the Kennedy School of Government.

She is a co-founder of the Women in Economics Network (WEN) in Australia and previously served as the WEN National Chair.

Dr Risse holds a PhD in Economics, Bachelor of Economics (Hons) and Bachelor of Arts from the University of Queensland.

woman in man's suit
People

The gender pay gap is shrinking and the good news is tech’s better than most industries, but don’t expect equal pay as an older woman

- November 20, 2024 4 MIN READ

Australia’s gender pay gap has been shrinking year by year, but is still over 20% among Australia’s private companies, a new national report card shows. But that gender gap is even bigger at 25% among chief executive officers, according to figures collected for the first time in 2023–24. And the widest gap of all is among… Read more »

Business woman on a tightrope
Women in tech

Claudia Goldin is the first woman outright to win the Nobel Prize in Economics for examining why we still have gender pay gaps

- October 11, 2023 3 MIN READ

In an astonishing act of timing, Harvard University’s Professor Claudia Goldin published a paper on Monday titled Why Women Won. It mapped milestone moments in women’s rights in the United States from 1905 to 2023. A few hours later, she was awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize in Economics “for having advanced our understanding of women’s… Read more »

Advice

Facebook boss Sheryl Sandberg’s advice for women to ‘lean in’ and be more confident doesn’t help – and the data shows it

- October 17, 2020 3 MIN READ

  “Just be more confident, be more ambitious, be more like a man.” These are the words of advice given over and over to women in a bid to close the career and earnings gaps between women and men. From self-help books to confidence coaching, the message to “lean in” and show confidence in the… Read more »