ANALYTICS
GENDER INEQUALITY
Why the women earn less and make less CEOs?
hy do women earn less than men in global? Why do they earn less doing the same job, with the same qualifications, for the same hours of work and results? Why are there less women CEOs? How is the world, and especially the EU, Europe and Croatia, doing in reducing this gap? There is a lot of talk about the equality of men and women, new nouns and genders are being introduced, but none of this hurts as much as one simple thing that’s necessary for real equality – for women and men (and those in-between, as people say today) to get the same pay for the same work. And capital is always particularly sensitive to its wallet. Not to mention vanity, which is hard to overcome – there may be more women teachers, saleswomen or managers in lower positions, but when it comes to the highest positions, we almost usually find men there because "it's a serious position, and men are more reliable”. This entire story has long been ready for disintegration, so let's see how the world moves according to these parameters.
W
THE WORLD IS MALE The gender pay gap or wage gap is the average difference between the benefits for working men and women. It is generally considered that women are paid less than men. There are two different numbers in terms of the wage gap: the non-adjusted pay gap versus the adjusted pay gap. The latter usually takes into account differences in working hours, chosen occupations, education and work experience. In the United States, the unadjusted wage gap (total wage bill for women) is such that the average female wage is 79% of the average male wage. When we look at the adjusted gap, the situation is better and women in the same positions earn 95% of men's salaries. There are many reasons for this, tradition is one of them, while those who try to find a realistic basis for their claims state that women should earn less because they are "physically weaker" (so they work less over the same amount of time), they take maternity leave so during their working life they have fewer working days than men (now men also have the right to maternity leave) and they take more sick leave both for themselves and for their children. Even so, children and childbirth are as important to society as profits, so companies must show social responsibility and stop punishing women for their physiology. ICELAND IS LEADING A BATTLE Iceland is the closest to complete equal-
10
ity is between men and women. On January 1, 2018, new legislation was introduced, and it specifies that all companies and state agencies that employ at least 25 people, must give women 100% of men's salaries. If that doesn't happen, they will be fined. In 2018, women received 14% to 18% less money than men. Iceland plans to achieve its goal by 2022. As of 2015, 44% of boardroom executives in Iceland were female, compared with the OECD average of 20%.
With all the nice words about female empowerment, without the same salaries and equal division of the highest functions, there will be no true equality or better society STATISTICS Payscale conducted a survey in 2020 and concluded that in 2020, women earned 81% of men’s salaries, an improvement of 7% since 2015, and with the adjusted gap, it turned out that women earned 98% of men salary for the same job and the same qualifications, compared to 97% in 2015. In the EU, women earn 84 ¢ for every euro earned by men. In the U.S., that figure is 80.5 ¢, according to the Census Bureau - and the gap is even higher for American women of color, according to Time. The worst situation is in Islamic countries - in Yemen women earn 15 times less than men, in Jordan, Iran, Pakistan or Oman 5 times less, in Egypt 4 times less, in the Emirates 3.3 times less. In South Korea, surprisingly, women earn 37% less, in Germany as much as 22% less than men, while Finland is at 82% of men’s salaries when it comes to women. Eurostat found a
persisting gender pay gap of 17.5% on average in the 27 EU Member States in 2008 and 14.8% in 2020. The worst is in Germany and Estonia, which is a big surprise, and the figures are 20.9% and 22.8%, respectively. In Croatia, in 2020 the difference was 10.5%, which is an excellent result. The best situation is in Romania, a country of considerable "matriarchy" where women hold a lot of director positions and where the differences are only 3%! In Burundi, there is a true African matriarchate – women earn more there! It is the only such country, by the way.
LEADERSHIP GAP But there is also the leadership gap. American Progress states: “Although they hold almost 52 percent of all management- and professional-level jobs, American women lag substantially behind men in terms of their representation in leadership positions. They are only 12.5 percent of chief financial officers in Fortune 500 companies. In 1980, there were no women in the top executive ranks of the Fortune 100 companies; by 2001, 11 percent of those corporate leaders were women. Women’s share of board seats in S&P 1500 companies increased 7.2 percentage points, or 94 percent, from 1997 to 2009, and their share of top executive positions increased 2.8 percentage points, or 86 percent. The share of companies with female CEOs increased more than sixfold.” WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? Although the situation is improving, it’s improving slowly. With all the nice words about female empowerment, without the same salaries and equal division of the highest functions, there will be no true equality or better society. And maybe it will first appear in Iceland, legally, or in Romania, organically.
CLICK TO GO www.diplomacyandcommerce.hr