Harassment and violence in the workplace: 1 in 2 women report it

According to a new report from Statistics Canada, one in two women have reported being harassed or sexually assaulted in the workplace during their career.

The agency said Monday that about 10 men had made similar reports.

Among the employed, people aged 25-34 had the highest incidence rate. About 60 percent of female workers and 39 percent of their male colleagues said they had endured such inappropriate behavior.

StatCan has defined workplace harassment as “hostile or objectionable behavior” including discrimination, as well as “inappropriate sexual behavior.”

Sexual assault includes unwanted touching and sexual activity “to which the victim is unable to consent because they are manipulated, coerced, intoxicated, or otherwise coerced in a non-physical way.”

About 44 percent of women said they had experienced sexually inappropriate behavior, 20 percent had been discriminated against, and 13 percent had been sexually assaulted. As for male workers, three in 10 reported inappropriate sexual behavior, nine percent reported discrimination and three percent said they had been sexually assaulted.

There were many disabled people in such reports.

According to the agency, verbal abuse was the most common form of harassment in the workplace, and women experienced it more often than men. Female healthcare workers are more likely to experience workplace harassment than women in other professions.

“It also found that more than half of women across all professions had reported clients or customers as sexually harassed,” the agency wrote.