Gender pay gap: Proportion of female high earners remains stubbornly unchanged at 27 per cent
Just over a quarter of the UK’s high earners are women, and new research shows this proportion hasn’t budged in years, despite initiatives to shrink the pay gap between men and women.
In absolute numbers, there are more women earning a high salary, as the number of high earners among both sexes has gone up by 1m in the past four years.
But the proportion of women remains stubbornly stuck at 27 per cent.
1.21m of the UK’s total 4.47m higher rate tax payers were women, shows HMRC data analysed by law firm Clyde & Co.
The gender pay gap in the UK currently stands at 19.1 per cent, meaning that women earn 80p for every £1 their male colleagues take home.
Heidi Watson, employment partner at the firm, said this showed that more initiatives were needed to reduce the gender gap:
Employers can get ahead of the game by focusing on their diversity programmes, voluntarily giving more information about these initiatives to put their figures in context.
The key will be demonstrating a positive picture to clients and potential recruits, and ideally showing a reduction in the gap over time.
Prime Minister David Cameron announced a pay transparency scheme in July, requiring all companies with more than 250 workers to reveal what they pay their male and female employees. The policy, which will come into force next year, was met with mixed reception:
“Not all companies will cheer the introduction of compulsory gender pay gap reporting, because it takes a complex set of issues and reduces it to a few headline statistics,” said Adam Marshall, executive director of external affairs and policy at the British Chambers of Commerce in July. [custom id="21"]