What is Gender Pay Gap?
It is the difference between the gross hourly earnings between working men and working women. Women earn over 16% less than men per hour in the EU.
Facts and figures
Women in the EU are less present in the labour market than men. The gender employment gap stood at 11%, with 68.2 % of women across the EU being employed compared to 79.2 % of men.
The gender pay gap in the EU stands at 16% and has only changed minimally over the last decade. It means that women earn 16% on average less per hour than men.
Women in the EU even earned 39.6% less than men overall in 2014. One of the reasons is the fact that on average women spend fewer hours in paid work than men: Whereas only 8.7% of men in the EU work in part-time, almost a third of women across the EU (31.3 %) does so.
Why do women earn less?
The reasons for the gender pay gap go beyond the simple issue of discrimination. They are a consequence of various inequalities women face in access to work, progression and rewards.
Sectoral segregation: Around 30% of the total gender pay gap is explained by the overrepresentation of women in relatively low-paying sectors, such as care and education. On the other hand, the proportion of male employees is very high (over 80%) in better-paid sectors, such as science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).
Work-Life Balance: Women spend fewer hours in paid work than men on average but more hours in unpaid work. In total, women have more work hours per week than men, what might affect their career choices. This is why the EU promotes a more equal sharing of parental leaves, an adequate public provision of childcare services and adequate company policies on flexible working time arrangements.
The glass ceiling: The position in the hierarchy influences the level of pay: less than 10% of top companies’ CEOs are women. The profession with the largest differences in hourly earnings in the EU were managers: 23 % lower earnings for women than for men.
Discrimination: In some cases, women earn less than men for doing jobs of equal value. However, the principle of equal pay for work of equal value is enshrined in the European Treaties (article 157 TFEU) since 1957.
Differences
between the EU countries
There are
considerable differences between EU countries. The gender pay gap ranges from
less than 8% in Belgium, Italy, Luxembourg, Poland and Romania to more than 20% in Czechia, Germany, Estonia and United
Kingdom. In most countries the gender pay gap is decreasing, whereas it is even
growing in a few.
However, a lower gender pay gap in certain countries does not automatically mean that women in general are better paid. A lower gender pay gap often occurs in countries with a lower employment rate of women. A high pay gap is usually characteristic of a labour market