ILO reports women paid 20% less than men, calls to close gender pay gaps

Anjali Sharma 

GG News Bureau

UNITED NATIONS, 19^th Sept. International Labour Organization said on Sunday that on average the women globally are paid about 20 per cent less than men as the agency marked the International equal pay day.

ILO said that a large part is due to discrimination based on one’s gender or sex, while individual characteristics such as education, working time, occupational segregation, skills, or experience explain part of the gender pay gap.

It stressed that building on the UN’s commitment against all forms of discrimination, including that against women and girls, Equal Pay Day represents longstanding efforts towards achieving the same wage for work of equal value.

The agency noted that women have been among the worst affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, including in terms of income security, representation in sectors hardest hit, and gendered division of family responsibilities.

It has led negatively impacted their employment and threatened to reverse decades of progress made towards gender equality.

The countries emerge from the pandemic, taking action to address gender equality setbacks is not only relevant and timely but also critical for an inclusive, sustainable, and resilient recovery, ILO stated.

It said that governments, employers, and workers organizations recognize that closing gender pay gaps is more important than ever.

ILO stressed that over the past few years, increasingly more governments are proposing transparency measures and information sharing to address gender wage gaps.

According to recent research, depending on how they are put into place, pay transparency measures can effectively identify compensation differences and reduce broader gender inequalities in the labor market, it stated.

Manuela Tomei, Director of the ILO Conditions of Work and Equality Department said that “These are still early days for pay transparency,” she noted that countries are pursuing different approaches to advance it.

She pointed out that “there is no ‘one-size fits all’ solution”.

“While more time is needed to assess the effectiveness of the different measures and practices, it is encouraging that Governments, workers’ and employers’ organizations seek to devise innovative solutions, such as pay transparency, to tackle a stubborn problem,” Ms. Tomei concluded.