Gender Pay Gap Increased in Ireland
6th March 2015
Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union, has published data on men and women with regard to pay and labour market differences.
Looking at wages in 2013 and 2008, they found the pay gap has increased between men and women in Ireland by 1.8% and now stands at 14.4%. The gender pay gap represents the difference between average gross hourly earnings of male paid employees and of female paid employees as a percentage of average gross hourly earnings of male paid employees.
In 2013 in the EU Member States, the gender pay gap was lowest in Slovenia (3.2%), Malta (5.1%), Poland (6.4%), Italy (7.3%), Croatia (7.4%), Luxembourg (8.6%), Romania (9.1%) and Belgium (9.8%). At the opposite end of the scale, the gender pay gap was over 20% in Estonia (29.9%), Austria (23.0%), the Czech Republic (22.1%) and Germany (21.6%).
There were also discrepancies in the type of employment held by men and women. In 2013, one employed woman out of three (31.8%) worked part-time, compared with fewer than 1 man out of 10 (8.1%) across the EU.
At EU level, a third (33%) of managers was female in 2013. Conversely, women accounted in 2013 for around two-thirds of all clerical support workers (67%) and of all services and sales workers (64%).
Ireland reflected this average managerial figure (33%) but Irish women over-represented among clerical support workers in 2013 (accounting for 46% of employed persons, 80% of clerical workers are women). Ireland and the Czech Republic (43% vs. 79%) have the highest proportions of women in these occupations.
For more information, visit Eurostat.
