Key Points
- The gender pay gap has stalled at 22.8 per cent in 2022, with women earning $26,596 less than men on average.
- The Workplace Gender Equality Agency says its the first time the pay gap has stalled.
- The Global Gender Gap Report 2022 ranked Australia at 43rd in the world for gender equality.
New research shows Australia is failing to make progress in addressing the gender pay gap.
According to federal government agency Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) the gender pay gap between Australian women and men has stalled at 22.8 per cent.
But what actually is the gender pay gap, how does it happen, and how does Australia compare to other countries?
What is Australia's situation?
On Monday WGEA released , which showed women earned on average $26,596 less than men in the 2021-22 financial year.
The WGEA 2021-22 Employer Census also found men are more likely to hold managerial positions, even in female-dominated industries such as healthcare and education.
The number of female Chief Executive Officers sits at 22 per cent.
What is the gender pay gap?
As the name suggests, the gender pay gap refers to women earning less than men overall.
It encompasses not only women being paid less than men for similar roles, but women filling fewer positions in leadership roles and on boards, or stepping back from full-time work for family reasons.
Helen Dalley-Fisher, convenor of Equality Rights Alliance, a network advocating for women’s equality, leadership and recognition of diversity, told SBS News there are two kinds of gender pay gap.
"There is the pay gap that is on your base salary, and quite often we tend to not see that if people are all being paid the same amount ... but the really big pay gap comes when we look at total remuneration," she said.
"It's about how many opportunities women have to get ahead in the same way that men have, and things like working part-time to take care of people is a really big impediment to that."
How does the gender pay gap happen?
WGEA director Mary Wooldridge told SBS News there are three main factors that contribute to the gender pay gap.
These include systemic bias, women's career progression being disrupted due to parenting and caregiving, and differences in pay for female and male-dominated industries.
"One factor is discrimination and bias toward women in recruitment and promotion and pay rises, the second is the time women take out of the workforce and then come back at a lower wage level or perhaps part-time, and the third is industrial and occupational segregation," she said.
"We have highly feminised industries that tend to be low paid, and highly masculinised industries like mining that tend to be highly paid," she said.
How does Australia compare to the rest of the world?
According to the Australia ranks 43rd in the world for gender equality.
Iceland, Finland and Norway were the top three, with New Zealand in fourth.
Data has revealed women in Australia are earning nearly $26,000 less than their male colleagues. Source: SBS News
In terms of economic participation and opportunities, Australia was ranked 38th.
Women from migrant and diverse backgrounds face additional barriers
WGEA collects data on age, gender and location, but does not yet have figures on other diversity factors such as whether an employee comes from a culturally or linguistically diverse background.
According to Ms Dalley-Fisher, women from migrant or refugee backgrounds, along with Indigenous women, are likely to face larger pay gaps.
"If you're from a migrant or refugee background, we know the pay gap is likely to be larger for you ... you're more likely to be working in a women-dominated industry, which means you're more likely to be on a lower income," she said.
"We know also migrant and refugee women are very likely to face extra barriers to getting into leadership positions ... the combined intersectional effect of racism and sexism make it not only difficult to get into leadership positions but too hard to try."
What can be done to improve the wage gap?
The government has introduced several initiatives to address the gender pay gap, including updating the objectives of the Fair Work Act to include pay equity and transparency, and making child care reforms to assist women returning to work.
Ms Wooldridge says workplaces also need to incorporate gender equality as an element of business strategy.
"It's absolutely fundamental that there's a leadership commitment to it, and that permeates all the way through the organisation," she said.
"There needs to be consequences and accountability in relation to performance on gender equality, and we need to do pay gap analysis so we know where the gaps are and then we can diagnose the problems and take action."
