Gender pay equity

Sara Charlesworth; Meg Smith

Gender pay equity

Sara Charlesworth
, Meg Smith

Research output: Chapter in Book / Conference Paper › Chapter

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Abstract

The persistent gender pay gap is an important driver of the current wages crisis in Australia. The gender pay gap is the difference between women's and men's earnings, expressed as a percentage of men's earnings. In 2018, the gender pay gap sat at 14.6%, only slightly improved from the early 2000s. Gender pay gap data based on AWOTE are the most commonly used metrics in Australia to measure progress towards gender pay equity, which is when women and men receive equal pay for work of equal or comparable value. However, this measure of the pay gap compares the ordinary time weekly earnings of men and women in full-time jobs only. It hides the gendered access to wage and benefit topups on ordinary time weekly earnings reflected in total full-time earnings. The full-time data also shed little light on the gender pay gap for almost half of Australia's working women, who work part-time and are not included in this metric. When we include average weekly earnings (AWE) for all workers, both full-time and part-time, the gender pay gap in 2017 rises to 32.4%. This high figure underscores women's significantly lower earnings relative to men's in Australia, which have ramifications for lifetime earnings, superannuation earnings and security in retirement.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	The Wages Crisis in Australia: What it is and What to do About it
Editors	Andrew Stewart, Jim Stanford, Tess Hardy
Place of Publication	University of Adelaide, S.A.
Publisher	University of Adelaide Press
Pages	85-101
Number of pages	17
ISBN (Electronic)	9781925261837
ISBN (Print)	9781925261820
Publication status	Published - 2018

Open Access - Access Right Statement

© 2018 The Contributors. This work is licenced under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial- NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) License. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0 or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA. This licence allows for the copying, distribution, display and performance of this work for non-commercial purposes providing the work is clearly attributed to the copyright holders.

UN SDGs

This output contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

SDG 5 Gender Equality
SDG 8 Decent Work and Economic Growth
SDG 10 Reduced Inequalities

Keywords

Australia
employment
pay equity
sex discrimination
superannuation

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title = "Gender pay equity",

abstract = "The persistent gender pay gap is an important driver of the current wages crisis in Australia. The gender pay gap is the difference between women's and men's earnings, expressed as a percentage of men's earnings. In 2018, the gender pay gap sat at 14.6\%, only slightly improved from the early 2000s. Gender pay gap data based on AWOTE are the most commonly used metrics in Australia to measure progress towards gender pay equity, which is when women and men receive equal pay for work of equal or comparable value. However, this measure of the pay gap compares the ordinary time weekly earnings of men and women in full-time jobs only. It hides the gendered access to wage and benefit topups on ordinary time weekly earnings reflected in total full-time earnings. The full-time data also shed little light on the gender pay gap for almost half of Australia's working women, who work part-time and are not included in this metric. When we include average weekly earnings (AWE) for all workers, both full-time and part-time, the gender pay gap in 2017 rises to 32.4\%. This high figure underscores women's significantly lower earnings relative to men's in Australia, which have ramifications for lifetime earnings, superannuation earnings and security in retirement.",

keywords = "Australia, employment, pay equity, sex discrimination, superannuation",

author = "Sara Charlesworth and Meg Smith",

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T1 - Gender pay equity

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AU - Smith, Meg

PY - 2018

Y1 - 2018

N2 - The persistent gender pay gap is an important driver of the current wages crisis in Australia. The gender pay gap is the difference between women's and men's earnings, expressed as a percentage of men's earnings. In 2018, the gender pay gap sat at 14.6%, only slightly improved from the early 2000s. Gender pay gap data based on AWOTE are the most commonly used metrics in Australia to measure progress towards gender pay equity, which is when women and men receive equal pay for work of equal or comparable value. However, this measure of the pay gap compares the ordinary time weekly earnings of men and women in full-time jobs only. It hides the gendered access to wage and benefit topups on ordinary time weekly earnings reflected in total full-time earnings. The full-time data also shed little light on the gender pay gap for almost half of Australia's working women, who work part-time and are not included in this metric. When we include average weekly earnings (AWE) for all workers, both full-time and part-time, the gender pay gap in 2017 rises to 32.4%. This high figure underscores women's significantly lower earnings relative to men's in Australia, which have ramifications for lifetime earnings, superannuation earnings and security in retirement.

AB - The persistent gender pay gap is an important driver of the current wages crisis in Australia. The gender pay gap is the difference between women's and men's earnings, expressed as a percentage of men's earnings. In 2018, the gender pay gap sat at 14.6%, only slightly improved from the early 2000s. Gender pay gap data based on AWOTE are the most commonly used metrics in Australia to measure progress towards gender pay equity, which is when women and men receive equal pay for work of equal or comparable value. However, this measure of the pay gap compares the ordinary time weekly earnings of men and women in full-time jobs only. It hides the gendered access to wage and benefit topups on ordinary time weekly earnings reflected in total full-time earnings. The full-time data also shed little light on the gender pay gap for almost half of Australia's working women, who work part-time and are not included in this metric. When we include average weekly earnings (AWE) for all workers, both full-time and part-time, the gender pay gap in 2017 rises to 32.4%. This high figure underscores women's significantly lower earnings relative to men's in Australia, which have ramifications for lifetime earnings, superannuation earnings and security in retirement.

KW - Australia

KW - employment

KW - pay equity

KW - sex discrimination

KW - superannuation

UR - http://handle.westernsydney.edu.au:8081/1959.7/uws:49134

M3 - Chapter

SN - 9781925261820

SP - 85

EP - 101

BT - The Wages Crisis in Australia: What it is and What to do About it

A2 - Stewart, Andrew

A2 - Stanford, Jim

A2 - Hardy, Tess

PB - University of Adelaide Press

CY - University of Adelaide, S.A.

ER -

Gender pay equity

Abstract

Open Access - Access Right Statement

UN SDGs

Keywords

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