“Women hold up half the sky,” Mao Zedong once said.

They also hold up 41% of China’s GDP, the biggest share in the Asia Pacific (followed by Thailand, Vietnam, Singapore, Australia, South Korea and the Philippines). In the Philippines, 142 women hold professional or technical jobs for every 100 men; China boasts 114 of the world’s 147 female self-made billionaires (America has 14). But China could add 13% to its GDP by 2025, if it increased women’s employment and productivity as quickly as the leading countries in Asia. That would translate into an extra US$2.6 trillion by 2025 (an economy the size of France). In India, the relative gain could be even greater (18%), because it has far more room to improve.