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Gender Pay Gap: The pay gap between women and men remains large.
© Annette Riedl/dpa
The earnings gap between women and men remains large.
In addition to unequal pay, differences can also be seen in working hours and labor participation.
Berlin - The earnings gap between women and men remains large.
The so-called “gender gap labor market” was 39 percent in 2023, just as in the previous year, as the Federal Statistical Office announced on Tuesday.
In addition to the wage gap (“Gender Pay Gap”), this indicator also includes differences in paid working hours (“Gender Hours Gap”) and labor force participation (“Gender Employment Gap”).
In addition to lower hourly wages, the main cause of this increased earnings inequality is the reduced working hours of women.
In the long term, inequality will decrease somewhat: compared to 2014, the “gender gap in the labor market” fell by six percentage points.
Women also earned much less than their male colleagues last year.
The wage gap (unadjusted “gender pay gap”) remained at 18 percent, as the statisticians reported in January.
According to this, women received an average of 20.84 euros per hour, which is 4.46 euros less than men (25.30 euros).
The reason for this is that women are more likely to work in lower-paying industries, professions and skill levels.
Differences can also be seen when it comes to pensions; women often receive significantly less than men.
The Economic and Social Sciences Institute (WSI) of the trade union-affiliated Hans Böckler Foundation also sees the “Gender Pay Gap” as the result of an unfair distribution of unpaid care work such as cleaning and washing at home and childcare.
“I would like to see a clear signal here to fathers to do their share of care work,” said the scientific director of the WSI, Bettina Kohlrausch.
A lack of care options in daycare centers and schools further exacerbated the situation.
Equal pay for equal work is “a given” for many
The employers' association BDA explained that the principle of "equal pay for women and men for equal work" is a "self-evident" for employers.
Rather, differences must be tackled at their roots.
Women are still less likely to work in technical professions (MINT) and more often in sectors with poorer earning prospects.
They also worked part-time more often and were less likely to have management positions.
“Crochet-free career guidance in schools, flexible working hours and better all-day care for children would be the right steps out of the stereotype trap.”
The Verdi union appealed to politicians to take measures to strengthen collective bargaining and to reconcile work and family life.
The German Association of Journalists meanwhile called on media companies to pay journalists equally.
Collective agreements provide for this.
“But the economic discrimination against female journalists begins where the level of income is a matter of negotiation,” said the union boss and DJV federal chairman Mika Beuster.
This affects media companies and freelance workers who do not have collective bargaining agreements.
Women more often work part-time
Women's more frequent part-time work means they earn less on average.
While men worked 148 hours of paid work per month in 2023, women only did 121 hours.
This means that women spent 18 percent less time on paid work than men (“Gender Hours Gap”).
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There are also differences in labor force participation.
Figures from 2022 show that 73 percent of all women had paid work, while the figure for men was 80.5 percent.
“This means that the gender employment gap in 2022 was nine percent.”
The wage gap for women in Germany, Austria and Switzerland also exists in bonus payments, not just in basic salary, as shown by analyzes by the Ifo Institute and the management consultancy Mercer for over 270 companies.
In Germany, women receive an average of 6.1 percent less in bonuses, in Austria 7.2 percent and in Switzerland 5.2 percent less.
“The gender-specific wage gap in bonus payments is significantly larger than in basic salaries,” said Ifo researcher Michaela Paffenholz.
“Because of these large differences, the gap in total salary is significantly larger.”
(Reuters, lf)