8 March 2010
Equal pay for equal work
International Women's Day will be celebrated in Australia and around the world on Monday 8 March.
On May 8, 1857 New York women employed in the clothing and textile industry finally took to the streets to demand better wages and conditions. Half a century later, in 1908, 15,000 women again marched in New York, and some went on strike, demanding better conditions and an end to child labour.
In Australia women were granted equal pay 40 years ago, and that should have been the end to pay inequity in this country. However in 2010, on average, women lag some 17 per cent behind in pay for equal work or work of same value and in some sectors, like finance and insurance this gender pay gap expands to a ripping 32 per cent.
Not surprisingly, 73 per cent of single aged pensioners are women, and women retire on average with about half the superannuation of men.
Australian women are world beaters in many fields from public service, to science, the arts, business, sport and politics. Australian women are ranked among the first in the OECD in gaining tertiary and other educational qualifications. However, the gender pay gap persists, and under Labor it is getting worse.
There are almost 5 million Australian women in the workforce and rates of participation are growing. Thirty per cent of small businesses are owned by women. As well, women commit thousands of hours and billions of dollars to the economy each year as the unpaid carers for children, the disabled and the elderly in their families.
Older women are the worst off as their careers have been interrupted or were never launched due to family responsibilities and met with little flexibility in paid work arrangements or paid parental leave. More frequent divorce today with worse financial consequences for women, combined with their fragmented or unpaid work, has too often locked them into an impoverished and welfare-dependent old age.
The gender pay gap is experienced at every level in the workplace in Australia, the land of the great Fair Go. It is regularly reported that the top 200 companies listed on the Australian Stock Exchange pay their female Chief Financial and Chief Operating Officers on average 50 per cent less than their male equivalents. Female CEOs earned 67 per cent less and women only occupied 7 per cent of the top five executive positions in these companies. Female CEOs are more likely to be employed in the not-for-profit sector. Women with disabilities are less likely to be employed than men with disabilities, and women are less likely to have the salary package add ons, like cars, phones and bonuses.
Sex Discrimination Commissioner, Elizabeth Broderick, describes poverty in Australia as having a feminine face. As she says, poverty should not be the reward for a life time of caring for others. Women and women's work cannot continue to be undervalued.
The ACTU has finally signalled that it is going to make gender pay equity a Federal election issue after decades of looking the other way.
The 54th session of the United Nation's Commission on the Status of Women is meeting in New York until 12 March to hear how much progress has been made in the 15 years since the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995. Unfortunately Australia, as a developed nation, does not have a good story to tell and must do better.
The World Economic Forum's The Global Gender Gap Report 2009 on wage equality for similar work showed Australia ranked 60th globally in 2009, declining from 51st in 2007. In terms of women's economic participation and opportunity Australia slipped from 12th to 22nd globally from 2007 to 2008.
On March 8, International Women's Day, many will focus their attention off shore and be collectively disappointed at the lot of women that has not improved in 20 years in third world countries. And we should all be appalled at this. However, let us not forget about our own failures, with Indigenous and non-indigenous women who do not have equity in pay in the work place.
Many are in denial about the gender pay gap, or simply do not want to know.
The Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Act requires businesses to report on other matters but not the pay gap. The House of Representatives Standing Committee on Employment and Workplace Relations "Making it Fair" report into pay equity tabled in 2009 has had no response from the Rudd Government.
Come on Australia, equal pay for equal work will make us a more productive nation, it will make us more internationally competitive, it will help to build women's sense of self worth and fair play, and it is just the right thing to do.
