It’s official, men are paid more than women at many of the country’s major companies, including banks, retailers, legal firms and mines, but what is being done to address it?
The latest gender pay gap report has revealed a woman is paid, on average, $18,000 less than a man over a year.
For the first time, many workers are now able to see what the gender pay gap looks like in their workplace and it can be tough reading.
The report, released by the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) yesterday, shows a gender pay gap across every sector in Australia, exacerbated in industries where there are bonus schemes or a reliance on over-time.
How is the gender pay gap calculated?
Australian companies with 100 or more employees are now required by law to publish the gender pay gap between their male and female employees.
The gender pay gap is calculated by working out the difference between the median pay of a man and a woman within one company.
The figure is then expressed as a percentage of male earnings and pay can be defined as base salary or total pay.
Part-time and casual salaries are converted into equivalent full-time annual earnings.
Medians are used, rather than average, so it’s not skewed by extreme values at either end.
What can you do to address a gender pay gap at your work?
Many businesses are now briefing staff on their gender pay gap in the coming month and experts say if your employer hasn’t organised this, you should ask them to.
Gemma Lloyd spent 10 years in the tech industry and founded Work180, a jobs platform that pre-screens employers to ensure they support women’s careers.
She said while the onus was on the employer and not workers, it was a good opportunity to start a conversation with your boss.
“I would be booking a meeting with the HR department and saying to them, ‘I know the pay gap is this and I would love to know what are the steps that this organisation is taking to close that gender gap’,” Ms Lloyd said.
“If the HR department doesn’t have an answer, that would be concerning for me as a woman in that workplace, and I would probably say, ‘is there a plan to have a strategy to close the pay gap?’
“It can be a difficult conversation to have, but certainly one worth having.”
What if your employer hasn’t revealed their gender pay gap?
Businesses with fewer than 100 employees are not currently required to disclose their gender pay gap.
But Kristen Hilton, a convenor of Champions of Change Coalition, a group of business and community leaders working to increase the representation of women in leadership, said it was reasonable to talk to your boss and ask whether the business had done anything to measure the gap.
“You can ask whether you are being paid equally and whether or not you’re getting equal access to overtime,” she said.
“Often employers don’t even realise that their systems and structures are unequal and are promoting some people and holding others back.”
Ms Hilton, who is also the former Victorian Human Rights commissioner, said there were examples across industries including retail, where rewards could be gendered.
“Is it because women don’t want to work overtime or is it because of caring responsibilities preventing them from accessing overtime or bonus payments?” she said.
Pay packet no longer a secret
Being able to now see the gender pay gaps, combined with recent changes to pay secrecy rules, means workers can actually make informed decisions about where they want to work, according to Corrina Dowling, an employment law specialist at Barry Nilsson.
“These two particular changes are going to ignite some discussions amongst individual employees and then questions are no doubt going to be raised with the employers,” she said.
“In a tight labour market there may be employees who are looking at this data and making decisions about where they want to work based on the gender pay disparity.”
Ms Dowling said the gender pay gap could be made worse as employers push for staff to return to the office.
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“Some of those employers are now offering higher pay to those people who are prepared to come into the office.
“That could play into this scenario where you once again, are going to have a disproportionate disadvantage effect on women who might prefer that flexibility of working from home, which is going to compound this gender pay disparity if there is one.”
Message for employers
Gemma Lloyd said there were lessons to be learnt from the United Kingdom, which since 2017 has forced companies to report on their gender pay gap.
“One of the worst things that we could see, which I’ve seen in the UK, are letters from the CEO being very defensive of their pay gaps and making excuses as to why they exist and not recognising that they’re legitimate.
“That would be a huge red flag for me,” she said.
“Either you take it seriously or be prepared to lose a lot of talented employees because it’s a competitive market out there.
“The power of choice is in the hands of women, and they’re going to be able to see that what you’re doing or what you’re not doing,” she said.