Hadia Tajik is concerned about the choices made by some highly educated young women

They take higher education. But when Norwegian-born, young women with an immigrant background turn 25, something happens that worries Hadia Tajik.

Hadia Tajik (Labor Party) was on Thursday named Norway’s most powerful woman by the newspaper Kapital. But the Minister of Labor and Social Inclusion is concerned. Concerned that good, enterprising and highly educated young women in Norway do not use their education. They do not work.

It created excitement that many Norwegian-born girls with immigrant parents chose higher education. In fact, to a greater extent than the rest of the population, 3.9 percentage points more. But there has been tension over whether the children, not least the daughters, of the first working immigrants who came in the 1970s, would enter working life. Or would they prioritize a home living with family and child care?

Tajik is uneasy about the development

Norwegian-born women with an immigrant background make up a lower proportion of those in work and education than the majority women. This especially applies to women aged 25-39. That worries me, says Tajik.

– There is reason to ask what is so special when women pass 25 years. These are ladies who have proven to have a huge drive, many have taken higher education with good grades.

The Minister refers to figures from 2018 from Statistics Norway (SSB). But also fresher figures, from 2020, which Aftenposten has obtained from Statistics Norway, show the same trend:

Norwegian-born women with an immigrant background have 8 percentage points lower participation in working life than majority women. Descendants of immigrants from Pakistan make up the largest group.