The Index offers a comprehensive look at statistics around how women are progressing at work and financially, as well as in education and leadership, noting the key statistics that can track what’s going on.
According to today’s release, the report finds the number of working full-time is still yet to crack the 3 million mark (at 2.96 million as of late 2016, compared with 5.2 million men), with 2.5 million women are currently engaged in casual and part time work.
While the number of women participating in the Australian workforce has increased over the past five years, there was a slight drop to 59.1% in November 2016, compared with 59.6% in November 2015.
Regarding the future of the pay gap, the report finds 70% of women are enrolling in tertiary studies that are not considered high paying sectors – despite the fact women now make up 52% of all tertiary education students.
Superannuation is also a problem, with the Index finding women are 30% behind on superannuation savings compared with men. Based on 2013/14 data (the most recent available), the Index reports the average female superannuation balance was just 70% that of the average male, five percentage points less than in 2009/10, when it was 75% that of the average male.
Meanwhile, the Index finds ASX top 20 companies have now surpassed a 30% target for women on boards as of March 2017, a 5 percentage point improvement on 2015.
Women are enrolling in tertiary education in significant numbers, and currently make up 52% of all students according to 2015 data
The Index aggregates data analysis across six key indicators and more than 700 reports to come up with its benchmarks, including from the ABS, the Australian Securities Exchange, the ATO and the Australian Government Department of Education and Training.
Financy Founder Bianca Hartge-Hazelman said she started the Index to provide a benchmark that could “cut through the noise and the debate around gender equality issues” and make us more accountable to progress.
“The Financy index achieves that while also telling us where policy makers, business, educators and women need to focus,” she said.
“Since starting Financy over a year ago I’m never short of receiving surveys and research on women, some of it conflicting and some really good. So I felt that if we created a real benchmark that digested 6 key indicators, based on deep diving into available research that we could make sense of all that noise.
“I’ve know Dan Petrie for years while he worked as a journalist and data analyst at Bloomberg, and he’s extremely talented. So when we got chatting about all the noise around gender equality issues, and our start ups we suddenly became excited about data and merging his technical skills with my insights on women.”