Australia’s national gender pay gap is going in the wrong direction. It’s up 0.3 percentage points over the past six months to 14.1 per cent, and is growing as more women are dealing with cost of living pressures.
That gap now sees women working full time earning an average $263.90 less than men working full time each week. It comes despite women joining the workforce in increasing numbers, and also as inflation is now at 6.1 per cent over the past year — leading to concerns of “Sheflation”, which is placing increased stress on Australian households, particularly single parent households.
The 14.1 per cent reflects the average weekly earnings data, released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics on Thursday. While the figure has grown over the past six months, it is slightly down from the 14.2 per cent reported for May 2021.
The gender pay gap expands to 29.7 per cent when considering “all employees”, with women significantly more likely than men to work part time.
Director of the Workplace Gender Equality Agency, Mary Wooldridge, said the gap impacts women’s financial freedom and hinders their ability to build financial independence for the future.
“As a result of the gender pay gap, many Australian women have to work harder to make ends meet, with very little room for discretionary spending or saving once they’ve covered the cost of daily essentials,” she said.
When you consider the growing cost of regular expenses like food, petrol, electricity and rent, Wooldridge says that a missing $264 a week in your back pocket makes a big difference.
“When you’re finding it tough to meet the essential costs of today it leaves little room to plan for tomorrow. Prioritizing daily essentials means that putting money aside in case of an emergency, for children’s education or saving for a house deposit is forced to take a backseat.”
The ABS also released gender pay figures between states and territories, with Western Australia recording the highest gender pay gap. In WA, the pay gap is a massive 22.4 per cent and sees women working full time earning $471.70 a week less than men working full time, thanks largely to the mining industry. South Australia recorded the lowest gender pay gap of the states and territories, at 7.4 per cent.
As for industry sectors, the largest gender pay gap is in the “professional, scientific and technical services” sector, where men are earning 25.3 per cent more than women, or an average $535.60 per week.
The figures were reported as the ABS also recorded an increase in employment over the past six months, including full-time employment, in lower paying industries like accommodation and food services — which have ultimately placed “some downward influence on changes in average earnings.”
Minister for Women Katy Gallagher said in response to the gender pay gap stats that “we must take targeted action to fix it.” She said it will be a key focus of the upcoming jobs and skills summit.
WGEA is calling for “leadership and commitment” to help fix the gender pay gap. They are calling on employers to take immediate action by undertaking pay gap audits. With this data available, WGEA says organisations will be able to identify problem areas and identify opportunities for improvement.
The below graphs from WGEA note the gender pay gap by state and territory, as well as by industry sector.
