How does the gender pay gap and unequal pay affect women in society today? Despite currently being illegal, unequal pay is still very much present. Birmingham City Council is effectively bankrupt due, in part, to unequal pay claims and is just one example of this topic’s relevance today and the need for it to be discussed.
What is the gender pay gap? The gender pay gap refers to the difference in women and men’s average pay in a workforce. This term is often confused with that of unequal pay which has been illegal since 1970 and refers to men and women getting paid different amounts for the same job. The gender pay gap might mean that, despite men and women in the same role, for example within a board of directors, being paid the same salary, if the majority of those who make up the board are men, in comparison to women occupying more of that industry’s lower paid jobs, a disparity emerges between the average pay for each gender, in other words, a gender pay gap. Even though salary data reports, which companies have been required to record since 2018, do not demonstrate unequal pay, they do help us to understand the relationship between the number of women who hold senior positions in companies and the reasons why this number may be low. There are many reasons why a gender pay gap exists in companies which favour hiring men, particularly in leadership and high salary roles. This can range from the fact that women often take on the primary carer role within the family and, therefore, are more likely to work part-time, to discriminatory factors. This may lead to women being unable to advance in their field of choice. According to the findings of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), 1 in 9 mothers are either dismissed or treated so poorly that they are forced to leave their jobs. This treatment within workplaces can be detrimental to women and their future career advancement as well as negatively impacting their mental wellbeing.
Equal pay means that everyone should get paid the same amount for jobs of equivalent value. Even though unequal pay has been illegal in the UK for around 50 years, there are many cases that have slipped under the radar. One of the most notable examples is that of Birmingham City Council, which had to pay a bill of £760m to settle equal pay claims. This majorly contributed to their effective bankruptcy and was a situation that could have been entirely avoided. The GMB, (a trade union for all workers), discovered that the Council did not properly implement important job evaluation schemes to ensure that men and women were paid comparatively for the same roles. It was also uncovered that the Council had applied a “task and finish” scheme (where workers are paid for every task they complete rather than being paid hourly) which was reportedly offered to the male workers and not the female. This practice allows workers who have access to it to clock out early and still be given the full hour’s pay. The Union further discovered that groups of male employees were supposedly working reduced hours while still being paid the full wage. All of these discoveries led to the Union refusing to sign the memorandum of understanding and instead, launching unequal pay claims. The idea that a large organisation can get away with such misconduct for so long highlights the importance of raising awareness of this issue in hopes of a more equal workplace in the future.
This unfair approach to the employment of women has long standing effects on those involved, creating a vicious cycle of inequality that can be hard to break. Through raising awareness of this issue, we can advocate and work towards a more equal and equitable working environment that favours everyone.