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Legislative Council - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
2016-11-02 Daily Xml
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Matters of Interest

Gender Pay Equality

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (15:26): As many in this chamber would know, I have a very proud background as a nurse and a longstanding association with the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Association. I was out to lunch recently with a young woman who lamented that many of her peers do not believe that feminism is necessary any more, yet she as a young woman entering a female-dominated field like nursing would earn substantially less than if she were to enter a male-dominated field, such as engineering.

This holds true across the board for female-dominated industries—teaching, child care, hairdressing, hospitality, retail, social work—all of which earn less than typically male-dominated industries, such as mining, construction and engineering. It is also interesting to note that male-dominated occupations, like engineering, are amongst the highest paid occupations in Australia, according to the ABS, while hospitality workers and hairdressers are amongst the worst paid occupations in Australia.

In 2014 Christopher Pyne, as the federal education minister, argued that university fee deregulation would not hurt women as they study occupations such as teaching and nursing, which earn less, as opposed to dentistry or law, meaning that the fees for those courses would be lower. He seems to have forgotten, in that statement, that women make up of 61 per cent, for instance, of law graduates, and I suppose he was correct, though, in that they still would not be earning what a typical male lawyer would earn, as the gender pay gap in the legal sector is amongst the largest in any industry—a whopping 36 per cent.

The other industry that was once male dominated and is now fairly equal in terms of gender is financial services. Like the legal industry, it has one of the largest gender pay gaps. The fact that industries that are male dominated are paid at such higher rates is often brushed off as their being more skilled industries, but the notion that teaching or nursing are not skilled industries is certainly a slap in the face to those incredibly capable and dedicated professionals. Social workers do some of the most gruelling work in this nation, yet their income rarely reflects the importance of their work.

At a certain point we have to ask why this is so. It is because society just does not value what is seen as women's work as much as what is seen as men's work. Across the board, Australia has a gender pay gap of 16.2 per cent. This has been supported by research and reports from many organisations, from the ABS to research organisations such as the Workplace Gender Equality Agency. This figure of 16.2 per cent means that, on average, men receive $27,000 more per year than women in remuneration and superannuation. Management positions are held overwhelmingly by men, with only 15.4 per cent of CEO positions and 27.4 per cent of senior management roles being held by women.

An October 2016 report by KPMG found that gender discrimination continues to be the largest contributing factor to the gender pay gap. This is the blatant discrimination that occurs when equally skilled workers who are employed in similar jobs earn different incomes and have different opportunities. Gender discrimination, as a component attributable to the gender pay gap, rose from 35 per cent in 2007 to 38 per cent in 2014. The second largest contributing factor was industrial and occupational segregation, which showed that incomes in occupations and industries with a larger share of males are on average higher than incomes for female-dominated occupations and industries.

The report also found that career and work interruptions were responsible for 21 per cent of the gender pay gap compared with 9 per cent in 2007. It is startling to think that this gap continues despite the reduction in the gap in skills, tenure and education. While Australian women are completing higher education at record high numbers, they are not progressing up the ladder at the same rate as Australian men.

We are in a situation in this country where industries that women dominate are generally less valued in monetary terms compared with male-dominated industries. Industries with near equal representation of women have the highest pay gaps in the nation and women are hugely under-represented in senior and executive levels. For all these things to continue to exist at the same time as some young women think that we do not need feminism is devastating and speaks to one of the reasons we need feminism most—women are told to be grateful for what they have already achieved, rather than to continue calling for true equality.

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