00:02The good news is we are seeing progress on narrowing the gender pay gap, which is the
00:07average of what women and men are paid in workplaces.
00:11So we've seen more companies closer to zero, which is very positive.
00:16About 2,000 of the 10,000 are within that plus or minus 5% range.
00:21We've seen more companies reduce their gender pay gap, the majority of them, and the average
00:27gender pay gap for where 50% of employers are above and below is 11.2%.
00:33So these are numbers that reflect how equality is experienced in the workplace.
00:39And you did touch on it there, but we just need to clarify what you mean by the gender
00:43pay gap.
00:44We're not talking equal pay for equal work.
00:46What are we talking here?
00:48No, equal pay for equal work has been the law for over 50 years and companies still do have
00:52to work each and every year to make sure that they're not getting out of sync in terms of
00:57what they're paying men and women.
00:59The gender pay gap measures something quite different.
01:02So it looks at the average or median salaries of all women and all men and does a comparison.
01:08And that could be in a workplace, in an industry or the nation as a whole.
01:11And so it's driven by both composition and pay, which a lot sits behind that in terms of the
01:18drivers of the gender pay gap and in every employer, the drivers of the gap are different.
01:23And people can see this data for themselves if they want to look it up.
01:27Tell us about which companies have to report this and how do people do a deeper dive on
01:33this?
01:34So every company with a hundred or more employees reports to the workplace gender equality agency
01:39every year.
01:40So this is their data.
01:42It's not us doing, you know, sort of fiddling with their data or trying to analyse it.
01:47But it's actually their information that they've provided to us.
01:50And on our website, wgea.gov.au, there's a data explorer.
01:55And all of those 10,000 plus employers are represented there, their gender pay gap information,
02:01the composition and their total remuneration at different quartiles, so different high
02:07earners and low earners and what the makeup of women and men are in those bands, but also
02:13policies and practices around their board, parental leave, flexible work practices and
02:18so on.
02:18There's a wealth of information.
02:20Really encourage people to go and have a look for their employer and start a conversation
02:24about what's driving the differences.
02:27What remains a key driver of this gap remaining, even if it is moving in the right direction?
02:33So there's a number of different things, but importantly, more women in higher paying
02:38roles is an important piece of work that's happening.
02:41At the moment, men are almost twice as likely to be in those higher paying roles than women,
02:47and women are 1.4 times more likely to be in the lower paying roles.
02:50So the opportunities for women to work at the most senior levels in the highest paying
02:56roles is important.
02:58And often it's workplace flexibility that enables women to take on those senior roles if they've
03:03also got caring responsibilities, for example.
03:06But we also need to make sure we're getting more men into what have traditionally been feminised
03:11industries so that we are recruiting for, say, healthcare and social assistance from the
03:16whole of the potential workforce rather than just from women.
03:19But unfortunately, some of those are lower paying roles.
03:22But we have seen a good increase in those salaries in those industries, and that's starting to
03:28attract more men.
03:30And finally, is the reporting and the publishing of this data having a positive impact in this
03:36space?
03:37Well, these reforms have been put in place because four or five years ago, the reduction
03:42in the gender pay gap had stalled.
03:44And what we've seen since, and this is the third year that we're publishing individual employer
03:49gender pay gaps.
03:50And there's other reforms that sit alongside this, that we have seen an increase in the,
03:56an improvement in the reduction in the gender pay gap.
04:00And that's what we need to see.
04:01Shortly, large companies are going to be selecting and committing to achieve gender equality targets.
04:06And we think that will be another boost.
04:09The objective is to accelerate the change so that men and women have fair and equal opportunities
04:14in the workplace.
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