EU Assesses and Attacks the Gender Wage Gap - Building Gender Balanced Business

• The European Union is fighting the gender wage gap across the region, a pay difference that results in the average European woman earning 17.4% less than the average — a shortfall that adds up to 160,000 euros over a lifetime of work.

• In fact, the wage gap expanded in some countries in 2007, the year a new EU report addresses.

• The European Commission’s Equality Between Men and Women 2009 report attributes the difference to issues such as maternity leave, the gender pay gap, traditions and stereotypes. It also noted the much larger percentage of women who work part-time, but the gap was measured in gross hourly wages.

• Oddly, countries with relatively low shares of women in the work force, such as Italy, had some of the smallest gaps.

• The new push to close the wage gap comes as the EU focuses on female employment as a key opportunity to reignite the economy. The US is also renewing efforts to reduce the difference, with President Barack Obama’s first signed bill being a measure to make it easier to combat wage discrepancies.

• Many of the principal European economies have some of the largest wage gaps, including Germany. For such countries, many observers, including the EU, noted the large number of part-time workers in the countries.

• EU Equal Opportunities Commissioner Vladimir Spidla said, “[M]arkets where many women work part-time (Germany, the UK, the Netherlands, Austria and Sweden) tend to result in countries with higher pay gap statistics.”

• Spidla added, “The gender pay gap has multiple causes and needs multiple solutions. Tackling it requires action at all levels and a commitment from everyone concerned, from employers and trade unions to national authorities and every citizen.”

• “The economic slowdown will probably harm women more than men, the report said, “because women are more often in precarious jobs.”

To download the report, click on Staff Working Document under Related Documents