for this reason a range of indicators are selected that capture gender inequality at different stages of the life cycle lastly the chapter focuses on the indicators that have been shown to matter for the overall development of the societies eg world bank for this reason not all key issues that affect women s wellbeing and are included in contemporary gender inequality indices could be covered it was not possible for instance to include measures such as income or access to highpaying jobs which are crucial factors for the economic standing of women kabeer what is lost in comparability with presentday indices however is made up for in the longterm perspective despite constraints in data availability there are theoretical and methodological criteria behind the choice of the gender equality variables employed