Remuneration and gender in Australia: background review and recent analysis.
Caddy, Ian
INTRODUCTION
There have been a range of attempts through legislation to address
the issue of inequality of remuneration between Australian men and women
workers. These attempts have a long history commencing with the Equal
Pay Case in 1969 and going forward with the Sex Discrimination Act of
1984. However, these decisions and legislation did not improve things
over time and workplace regulation was extended with the Workplace
Relations Act of 1996 and the Fair Work Act of 2009. While the Workplace
Relations Act recognised the principle that there should be no
discrimination in remuneration of men and women where work of equal
value is performed, the Fair Work Act extended this principle to one of
equal or comparable value. So again this strengthening of the
legislative framework should have led to some equality of remuneration
for women Australian workers today; this does not seem to be the case.
Unfortunately, when looking at and analysing recent published
statistical series, inequality still exists in 2013. These differences
are seen at the aggregate level in terms of Australian average weekly
earnings, data emerging from the monthly Australian Labour Force Survey
and the Earnings and Hours statistics. There is consistency across all
of these statistical series in supporting the assertion that inequality
in remuneration still exists. For example, when looking at earnings data
across occupations, while some equality has been achieved for a few
occupations, the overwhelming majority of occupations reveal inequality.
Yet the Fair Work Act of 2009 states that there should be equality of
remuneration for work of equal or comparable value; being classified at
the same occupation should surely meet that particular test. Analysis
was also conducted for a group of ASX-listed corporations using data
disclosed in the remuneration reports for their directors and other
senior executives. The presumption here again was that the work of these
directors and senior managers should be seen as work of equal or
comparable value and so there should be remuneration equality. The
analysis presented below indicates that for the 2012 financial year (for
this selected set of large corporations which should be expected to be
leaders on this issue) there was still substantial difference in the
remuneration of men and women senior executives in these corporations.
EQUAL REMUNERATION IN AUSTRALIA: HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE
In Australia there has been a long history of legislation passed in
both federal and state parliaments dealing with anti-discrimination. For
example, the Federal Sex Discrimination Act of 1984 prohibits any
discrimination made against a person on the basis of their gender, their
marital status or any other relationship status, their sexual
orientation, their actual pregnancy or their potential to become
pregnant at some point in the future. The Sex Discrimination Amendment
(Pregnancy and Work) Act of 2003 further defined the rights and
responsibilities of employers in this area. Furthermore, under this
amendment Act, employers cannot dismiss employees due to their family
responsibilities; the Sex Discrimination Act also includes sanctions
against either employers or fellow employees for any acts defined by
this Act to be deemed sexual harassment. Finally, the Act attempts to
gain public recognition of the principle of equality between the
genders. These and other federal legislation align or implement
obligations that Australia had by its ratification in 1983 of the UN
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against
Women and Convention 156 of the International Labour Organisation. The
Australian Human Rights Commission and the Fair Work Ombudsman are two
current government agencies that actively work to ensure that there is
equal opportunity between the genders within Australian workplaces and
that discrimination and sexual harassment within the workplace are kept
to a minimum at worst, or completely eliminated at best.
With respect to equal pay or remuneration for women compared to
men, Jost (1998) claimed that this has been an area of interest and
advocacy from early in the 20th century leading up to the Equal Pay case
heard by the Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Commission in
1969. The case dealt with equal pay for women working in the public
service and in the Australian meat industry. It is interesting to note
that the decision made in this case was to affirm gender differences in
remuneration. Prior to this case it was recognised that there should be
a positive difference between men's and women's remuneration
as the former were seen to have the responsibility of providing for the
family, while the latter were seen as providing support for a single
person (women) only. The Commission rejected the claim by unions for
equal pay for women as they stated that there was no evidence before it
on which it could determine that equal work was being done by men and
women in either the public service or the meat industry. And so was
established the "equal pay for equal work" principle that
applies to some extent even in 2013. Despite this principle being set
down, and the legislation discussed in the previous paragraph having
long been introduced, Jost (1998, p. 7) still found a difference between
men and women in their remuneration using average weekly earnings data
for May 1996 (however, as will be argued in a later section, these data
only provide a limited opportunity for analysis):
Adult women working full-time currently earn around 79.5 per cent
of men's total ordinary time earnings. Non-managerial full-time
adult women workers earn 83 per cent of men's earnings. If all
employees--full-timers, part-timers, adults and juniors--are
included in the calculations, women employees earn 66 per cent of
the total earnings all male employees receive.
Another major piece of federal legislation concerned with ensuring
equal pay between men and women was the Workplace Relations Act of 1996.
This Act states that equal pay should occur for those men and women who
are deemed to be doing work of equal value (not necessarily the same
work); therefore this Act broadened the principle created through the
1969 Equal Pay Case. This remuneration to a worker can occur through an
industrial award, a certified agreement (such as an enterprise bargain)
or an Australian Workplace Agreement (AWA) which is something this Act
introduced into Australia for the first time. Where differences in
remuneration between men and women are found, then the pay of women is
to be raised rather than the pay of men to be reduced (so-called
'levelling up' rather than 'levelling down').
However, discrimination in remuneration may be implicit rather than
explicit and so the gap becomes harder to eliminate. As Jost (1998, p.
1) claims:
The equal pay issues of the 1990s are far more complex than this.
For example, female-dominated jobs may be paid lower over-award
payments than male-dominated jobs; job evaluation processes may
undervalue female-dominated occupations and therefore set lower pay
rates compared with male dominated jobs; or part-time workers may
not be paid the same as full-timers doing the same jobs, on a
prorata basis. All these factors, and others, contribute to unequal
pay between men and women.
In terms of this complexity or implicitness rather than
explicitness, Jost (1998) considers one example of a firm that included
'time at desk' as part of its performance appraisal system
which itself was linked to reviews and increases in remuneration. It was
found that women were discriminated against as their family commitments
meant that they did not work as long hours (time spent at their desk) as
men and so did not achieve the same levels of increases in remuneration.
As Jost (1998) states, the main problems in removing differences in
equal remuneration are: lack of transparency in either performance
appraisal or remuneration assessment processes; different levels of
discretionary payments (which can include things like participation in
profit-sharing arrangements) paid to males and females within the same
firm; different levels merit pay or bonuses paid to men and women;
different rewards that apply to men and women through the firm's
superannuation scheme(s); different hours of work by men and women
particularly in the area of overtime and above award pay; and different
perceived values about market rates when setting levels of remuneration.
As the next section will show this subtle or implicit discrimination has
been of much interest to researchers in this particular area of
remuneration.
So it would appear that the sticking point since the 1969 case, is
this concept of work being of equal value (this principle was reaffirmed
in the 1972 Equal Pay Case). Given that the work men and women perform
does not have to be entirely equivalent ,we are then involved in a
process of trying to infer equality which is by far a more difficult
concept and one that is open to interpretation, with, in most cases,
presumably the decision that the work was not of equal value. The
Workplace Relations Act of 1996 is not very prescriptive in terms of
providing a method through which equality was to be established, but
merely states that whatever process was developed it needed to be
objective rather than subjective. Furthermore, this objective method
needed to look at the job content when making a determination whether
the work is of equal value or not. Finally, the 1996 Act also provides
for audits of remuneration practices in a firm to determine if any
differences between remuneration of men and women working in that firm
comply with the requirements of this Act; however, the number of audits
actually conducted was quite small. It would appear that overall the
Workplace Relations Act made some positive improvements to those
regulations attempting to ensure equality of remuneration between men
and women.
The discussion in later sections looks at two different scenarios
with regard to job content: one looks at remuneration data by
occupation; the other looks at remuneration for senior executives of
Australian corporations publicly listed on the Australian Securities
Exchange (ASX). As will be considered in the following paragraph, at the
time that the Workplace Relations Act came into existence, namely 1996,
about 75% of workplace agreements were covered by industrial awards.
However, since 1996 this has dramatically changed with enterprise
agreements (usually the result of negotiations between unions and the
firm) and individual workplace agreements (AWAs) now assuming the major
proportion of workplace agreements. This means that the framework of
workplace agreements covering working conditions and remuneration of
workers have become far more complex. It is through this diversity and
proliferation of agreements that the chances have increased of unequal
remuneration either coming into existence with new jobs being created or
that have developed in existing jobs over time.
The final piece of federal legislation to impact on equality of
remuneration between Australian men and women workers is the Fair Work
Act of 2009 which essentially replaced the Workplace Relations Act of
1996. This legislation was mainly the result of the work completed by
Julia Gillard when she was Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for
Workplace Relations. Fair Work Australia, the tribunal created under
this Act, commenced operations on 1 July 2009. Through an agreement with
the remaining states (Victoria, the ACT and the Northern Territory had
already passed over their state responsibilities in the area of
employment relations to the federal jurisdiction) on 1 January 2010 the
scope of deliberations and actions to be heard by Fair Work Australia
was expanded to include almost all employers and their employees
(private, government and non-profit) within Australia, establishing the
first truly national system covering workplace relations. On either 1
July 2009 or 1 January 2010 Fair Work Australia took over the functions
and responsibilities of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission,
the Australian Industrial Registry (the repository of things such as
awards, enterprise agreements, etc.), the Workplace Authority, and the
wage setting function of the Australian Fair Pay Commission which
determined the level of minimum pay in Australia. Included within the
responsibilities of Fair Work Australia was to ensure equality of
remuneration between men and women; although when looking at the
organisational structure and the outcomes and outputs of this tribunal,
this aspect of workplace relations was not seen as being a principal
focus.
However, in May 2011, Fair Work Australia heard the Equal
Remuneration Case relating to a dispute concerning pay discrimination
against women working in Australian social services, disability services
and community-based organisations (the so-called SACS sector of the
Australian economy). Given that the Fair Work Act of 2009 now considered
remuneration related to work of 'equal or comparable value'
rather than just 'equal value', the tribunal concluded that
decisions made by previous industrial relations tribunals in this area
were no longer applicable and for these particular workers found that
there was not equal remuneration for equal or comparable work. A new
benchmark in determining equality in remuneration had been set. In June
2012 Fair Work Australia made an Equal Remuneration Order (Fair Work
Ombudsman, 2012) to put into effect this decision and so gradually
increase pay for women in these industries under the relevant awards. A
new name for the tribunal, namely the Fair Work Commission, became
effective from 1 January 2013, as a result of Parliament passing the
Fair Work Amendment Act, 2012. Other current federal bodies that have
responsibilities in the area of workplace relations are the Fair Work
Ombudsman, Fair Work Building and Construction, the Federal Court of
Australia (through its Fair Work divisions) and the Federal Circuit
Court of Australia. The Fair Work Amendment Act of 2013 came into effect
from 28 June 2013. In terms of gender issues this Act made changes
regarding leave arrangements for pregnant women as well as further
improvements to ensure safe working conditions for pregnant women. As
well, applications for more flexible working arrangements that would
impact mainly on women workers were also introduced by this 2013
amendment Act.
In the area of equality in remuneration, the Fair Work Commission
established the Pay Equity Unit on 19 March 2013 as a result of a
direction from the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations. This
Unit was to raise awareness within the Commission about inequalities in
remuneration based on gender through targeted research and information
provision. This research and information would be used by the Commission
on equal remuneration matters that arise before it commencing from 1
July 2013. This decision suggests that equal remuneration will now
become a more prominent issue than has been the case in previous years.
Specifically, this Unit will have the following duties for the financial
year 2013-14 and onwards (Fair Work Commission, 2013, p. 65):
* commission research into equal remuneration under the Fair Work
Act
* collect data on pay equity matters, and
* review current pay equity research and catalogue available data
for use in research.
It will be interesting to see what changes emerge from the work of
this Unit and the decisions made in the area of inequality in
remuneration by the Fair Work Commission over the coming years.
RECENT LITERATURE RELATING TO ISSUES OF REMUNERATION AND GENDER
As will be shown below, there are many issues that have an impact
on why women still find that their levels of remuneration are below that
of men often in spite of the fact that there is evidence showing that
they are performing equal work or work that is equal or comparable in
nature. One thing to emerge from this review of the recent research
literature is the subtlety through which discrimination now occurs; that
is, legislative frameworks and processes have removed the simpler and
more overt forms of discrimination and so have left behind less overt
and more complex or subtle forms of discrimination that are possibly
harder to remove. For example, one classic argument to emerge from the
human capital research is that women's remuneration is less because
they have inferior educational qualifications or that their years of
experience or tenure within the organisation are less than their male
counterparts (Roos & Gatta, 1999; Sicilian & Grossberg, 2001)
due to, say, interruptions to their careers for child bearing and
rearing reasons. Because of these circumstances, so the argument goes,
it means that women are more likely to miss out on higher paying jobs in
which they would do well. However, over the last decade, the enrolment
experiences at Australian universities show that more females enrol in
courses as compared to males. Further, given paid parental leave schemes
either in place or to be introduced, should mean that women have less
fragmented careers. So these arguments which are related to less overt
forms of discrimination will not have the same force today as they have
had in years or decades gone by.
One issue with a lot of recent research into the gender gap between
men's and women's remuneration has been the focus mainly on
jobs with fixed remuneration paid either as a wage or a salary (Gerhart
& Rynes, 2003; Werner & Ward, 2004). However, in many cases,
particularly with respect to senior managers within an organisation,
this represents only one component of their overall remuneration
package. As discussed later, these senior women managers are seen as a
group of workers for whom little justification is required to determine
that their work is of equal or comparable value. Gomez-Mejia and Wiseman
(1997) call on further research about the impact of variable or
performance based remuneration of female executives and the role that
behavioural practices may have in determining this type of remuneration.
There are also fewer senior women managers in large, as compared to
small, firms. Large firms normally remunerate at a higher level and so
this may be another subtle way causing inequality, particularly when
looking at remuneration of chief executive officers (Tosi, Werner, Katz
& Gomez-Mejia, 2000). These are examples demonstrating the subtlety
and complexity when looking at whether or not there is equality of
remuneration between men and women.
One issue to emerge out of recent research and one that obviously
has a significant impact on equal pay for men and women is whether or
not women have an equal chance of being appointed to, or promoted to,
senior management positions within an organisation; this is often
referred to as the "glass ceiling" (Maume, 2004; Dimovski,
skerlavaj& Man, 2010; Matsa & Miller, 2011). Organisations,
either knowingly or otherwise, may put in place barriers (which often
become higher and more difficult to overcome as the management position
becomes more senior within the organisation) that prevent women from
gaining these positions. For example, Wirth (2004) claims that less than
3% of top level positions in firms selected across a number of countries
are filled by women. Not only are there barriers within firms, but there
may also be barriers between firms impacting on and related to the job
mobility of women as compared with men (Russo & Hassink, 2012).
Given that in the knowledge-based or post-industrial economy,
professional workers pursue their careers across organisations rather
than within organisations, this latter issue again may give rise to
another subtle form of discrimination in the sense of reduced
opportunities for women to get ahead in the profession of their
choosing.
When looking at senior women managers, there is also the related
issue that many are appointed to what are seen as 'precarious
positions'. There are two main connotations associated with this
term. First, precarious is used to denote those temporary, part-time or
non-standard positions that organisations are increasingly relying upon
(Ruyter & Warnecke, 2008). Not surprisingly women are
over-represented in these sorts of precarious positions (Presser,
Parashar & Gornick, 2008). Young (2008) concluded that to some
extent women can become trapped in these positions as they provide
limited workplace rewards and experience and reduce the opportunities of
women to obtain less precarious and better paid positions. Furthermore,
judging by the time and importance that women still display towards the
home, they also may unwittingly be sending messages that they have a
lower commitment to full-time work and so again lower their chances of
gaining jobs with higher pay (Blair-Loy, 2003).
The second connotation of precarious positions within an
organisation is the notion that women, particularly women who are senior
managers or executives, are more likely to be appointed to positions in
which there is a higher risk of failure when compared to male senior
managers; this is what Ryan and Haslam (2007) have referred to as the
"glass cliff". Having been given a more challenging task at
which to succeed, these women have a higher probability of failing,
resulting in damage to their reputation, which then reduces their chance
of further promotion within that organisation or to their chance of
gaining higher paying jobs in other organisations. This loss of
opportunity presents another mechanism through which remuneration for
women can become less than for men. Bruckmuller and Branscombe (2011)
consider that this issue may be driven by a status quo bias. That is,
firms that are led by men CEOs and seen to be successful will more than
likely have men as the successor CEO. On the other hand firms that are
currently in financial difficulty may decide that change in the gender
of the CEO is an option that may restore the firm's financial
health; if this does not occur then the woman CEO is to blame. However,
there are many reported incidences of male CEOs being approved to rescue
high profile organisations. Furthermore, Adams, Gupta and Leeth (2009)
in their analysis of appointments to chief executive officer positions
to US firms, found that on average females became CEOs of firms in
better financial health than was the case for males CEOs (see Ryan and
Haslam (2009) for a rebuttal of these previous authors' findings).
So it would seem that the existence of a "glass cliff" does
need further research to either substantiate or refute this claim and
whether or not it is yet another subtle way in which inequality in
remuneration between men and women may arise.
So it would appear that despite regulatory frameworks being put in
place to ensure that remuneration is equal between males and females
there is still a gap that needs to be removed and issues that need to be
addressed. The following section looks at recent data compiled by the
Australian Bureau of Statistics which indicates that while changes have
occurred since the equal pay case of 1969 and the remuneration case of
1972, there is still a fair distance to go before the claim can be made
that there is no discrimination in Australia when comparing the
remuneration of men and women.
AUSTRALIAN LABOUR FORCE SURVEY AND EARNINGS AND HOURS STATISTICS
When looking at statistics for remuneration there are three
relevant statistical series compiled by the Australian Bureau of
Statistics. First, there are statistics compiled from the Australian
Labour Force Survey (ABS(a), 2013) which shows levels of full-time and
part-time employment by gender as well as numbers of men and women
unemployed, their unemployment rates and their participation rates
within the labour force. Second, there are statistics compiled on weekly
earnings for full-time employees in Australia (ABS(b), 2013) with
published output showing full-time ordinary hours average weekly
earnings for private and public sectors as well as total average weekly
earnings (including above award pay such as overtime and shift
allowances, etc.). Third, there are statistics compiled on earnings and
hours worked for employees in Australia by occupation (ABS(c), 2013).
As indicated in Figure 1 below, which presents time series data on
average weekly earnings for males and females, there appears to be a
sustained gap between the earnings of males compared to females. This
gap is irrespective of whether overtime and other above award payments
are included or not. Indeed, as far as these payments are concerned,
Figure 1 shows these are smaller in proportion for women when compared
to similar payments for men. However, as these are aggregate figures,
care should be taken in terms of definitively stating that equal
remuneration in Australia does not exist. For instance the gap shown in
Figure 1 could be due to women selecting jobs, either voluntarily or
otherwise, which are lower paying than those selected by men.
Notwithstanding these comments, what this time series does show is that
the gap in remuneration between men and women is widening rather than
converging (at least over the last decade) indicating again that at an
overall level the current regulatory frameworks and processes have
failed to make any headway toward equality of remuneration.
[FIGURE 1 OMITTED]
However, as stated above, Figure 1 presents only a limited analysis
of female employment in Australia. Although as indicated in Figure 2
below there are an increasing proportion of women working in full-time
rather than part-time jobs, the movement from part-time to full-time
positions over the last three decades has only been slight. Even as late
as the June quarter 2013, about 70% of all women working did so in
part-time jobs with only 30% working in full-time jobs. So with respect
to the first connotation of a precarious position, women still
overwhelmingly find themselves working in precarious positions that in
most cases do not have any career prospects towards higher paid work.
However, the participation rate of women in the labour force has
improved, possibly due to organisations offering potential employees
more part-time positions rather than full-time ones. It is also
interesting to note the equivalent decline in labour force participation
rates by men as indicated in Figure 3 below.
[FIGURE 2 OMITTED]
Finally with the convergence of participation rates there has also
been a similar experience with the unemployment rates of men and women
shown in Figure 4 below. The unemployment rate for women was at times
below that of men with the exception of the period February 1978 to
November 1990 when it was always higher than the male unemployment rate.
[FIGURE 3 OMITTED]
[FIGURE 4 OMITTED]
Although the data presented above is mainly for full-time
employees, Table 1 below presents weekly cash earnings for both
full-time and part-time employees by gender from the biennial earnings
and hours statistical collection, for which the latest data available
are for the year ended 31 May 2012. These data again confirm that at an
aggregate level there is a remuneration gap of in cash weekly earnings
of $279.70 between males and females in full-time positions, while women
in part-time positions earn $8.50 more mainly due to those women working
under a collective agreement (women, on average, earn $50.80 more under
these arrangements).
So as far as broad labour force indicators are concerned, things
would appear to have improved a little for Australian women,
particularly with respect to remuneration in part-time positions. But as
is often the case when looking at this issue, the devil is in the
detail. When analysing the cash weekly earnings data by occupation, from
the biennial earnings and hours statistical collection (ABS(c), 2013)
this shows that even today there are many occupations in which men and
women do essentially equal or comparable work but women receive less
remuneration than do men. Of the 266 occupations for which meaningful
comparisons of remuneration between men and women can be performed, in
218 occupations men earned more than women; in 18 occupations
remuneration between men and women was roughly equal (within [+ or -]5%
tolerance); and in only 30 occupations did women earn more than men.
Table 2 presents some interesting insights into those occupations where
women do earn more than men:
Table 2: Cash Weekly Earnings Where Women Earn More Than Men, May
2012
Males Females
Occupation $ $
AVERAGE WEEKLY TOTAL CASH EARNINGS ($)
Supply and distribution managers 1,999.00 2,088.10
Other education managers 2,064.60 2,089.90
ICT managers 2,262.40 2,448.00
Caravan park and camping ground managers 648.40 690.10
Authors, and book and script editors 1,176.10 1,250.70
Electrical engineers 1,910.30 2,193.80
Other engineering professionals 1,663.40 1,734.20
Education advisers and reviewers 1,573.80 1,763.00
Teachers of English to speakers of 736.30 904.40
other languages
Optometrists and orthoptists 1,013.60 1,430.70
Dental practitioners 2,110.50 2,251.70
Podiatrists 1,144.50 1,169.90
Generalist medical practitioners 2,197.80 2,345.80
Multimedia specialists and web 1,168.20 1,298.80
developers
Computer network professionals 1,577.30 1,611.70
Motor mechanics 958.70 1,079.80
Structural steel and welding trades 1,491.20 1,939.90
workers
Carpenters and joiners 1,115.60 1,146.00
Painting trades workers 980.70 995.10
Electricians 1,448.00 2,080.10
Chefs 1,000.90 1,048.00
Hairdressers 592.80 611.60
Printers 1,097.80 1,129.40
Clothing trades workers 744.70 796.30
Enrolled and mothercraft nurses 733.40 866.00
Welfare support workers 774.20 809.10
Child carers 369.70 495.40
Education aides 466.20 541.80
Fire and emergency workers 1,196.50 1,266.10
Survey interviewers 393.30 557.30
Conveyancers and legal executives 1,089.80 1,114.70
ICT sales assistants 622.70 789.10
Pharmacy sales assistants 468.70 488.80
Retail and wool buyers 1,029.20 1,581.60
Visual merchandisers 591.20 822.80
Other sales support workers 391.20 610.70
Sewing machinists 598.20 621.10
Truck drivers 1,299.70 1,478.20
Paving and surfacing labourers 1,300.80 1,922.90
Fast food cooks 195.40 224.90
Food trades assistants 407.90 582.40
Kitchen hands 406.50 457.10
Caretakers 720.40 821.90
Vending machine attendants 752.70 819.10
Persons
Occupation $
AVERAGE WEEKLY TOTAL CASH EARNINGS ($)
Supply and distribution managers 2,007.70
Other education managers 2,081.40
ICT managers 2,306.10
Caravan park and camping ground managers 669.20
Authors, and book and script editors 1,197.90
Electrical engineers 1,966.80
Other engineering professionals 1,677.20
Education advisers and reviewers 1,720.30
Teachers of English to speakers of 887.20
other languages
Optometrists and orthoptists 1,370.20
Dental practitioners 2,187.00
Podiatrists 1,161.50
Generalist medical practitioners 2,250.50
Multimedia specialists and web 1,180.50
developers
Computer network professionals 1,583.30
Motor mechanics 959.50
Structural steel and welding trades 1,496.60
workers
Carpenters and joiners 1,116.00
Painting trades workers 983.80
Electricians 1,451.50
Chefs 1,015.00
Hairdressers 608.70
Printers 1,099.40
Clothing trades workers 780.40
Enrolled and mothercraft nurses 855.80
Welfare support workers 799.50
Child carers 488.40
Education aides 534.60
Fire and emergency workers 1,203.60
Survey interviewers 475.30
Conveyancers and legal executives 1,112.60
ICT sales assistants 676.50
Pharmacy sales assistants 487.40
Retail and wool buyers 1,366.80
Visual merchandisers 758.50
Other sales support workers 528.60
Sewing machinists 613.40
Truck drivers 1,305.30
Paving and surfacing labourers 1,329.70
Fast food cooks 205.80
Food trades assistants 513.70
Kitchen hands 436.90
Caretakers 734.20
Vending machine attendants 791.30
Source: ABS, Employee Earnings and Hours, May 2012, Catalogue
no. 6306.0, Australian Bureau of Statistics, Canberra.
At first glance this collection of occupations seems rather
eclectic, particularly when it includes occupations such as
electricians, fire and emergency workers and truck drivers. When looking
at occupations in which women are paid the same as or more than men, and
then looking at occupational groups rather than individual occupations,
the analysis finds that there are four management occupations, 17
professional occupations, 11 technicians and technical worker
occupations, six community and personal service occupations, six
clerical and administrative worker occupations, seven sales worker
occupations, six machinery operator and driver occupations and seven
labourer occupations. This analysis again confirms that there is no real
underlying pattern as to why the occupations in this set are ones in
which women have achieved either equal or greater remuneration as
compared to men. One limitation of this analysis is that there is no
information about the number of men and women employed in these
occupations and so any more detailed analysis other than counting
occupations cannot be completed. Data on numbers employed in occupations
(but only at the occupational group level) are available through the
labour force survey; summary data for the May 2012 quarter are presented
shown in Table 3 below:
Table 3: Number Employed by Occupation, Full-time & Part-time,
May Quarter 2012
Males
Occupation group/
workers No. %
Employed Full-time
Managers 907.6 69.3%
Professionals 1073.2 55.0%
Technicians & Trades 1315.6 90.8%
Community and Personal Service 219.5 43.7%
Clerical & Administrative 356.6 31.7%
Sales W 241.9 55.1%
Machinery Operators and Drivers 600.9 93.4%
Labourers 504.0 76.6%
Total, all occupations 5219.3 64.6%
Employed Part-time
Managers 76.1 37.9%
Professionals 158.8 24.9%
Technicians and Trades 145.0 58.6%
Community and Personal Service 133.3 22.1%
Clerical & Administrative 59.0 10.5%
Sales 148.2 24.4%
Machinery Operators and Drivers 74.6 77.5%
Labourers 247.2 48.5%
Total, all occupations 1042.2 30.1%
Employed Full-time or Part-time
Managers 983.6 65.1%
Professionals 1232.0 47.6%
Technicians and Trades 1460.6 86.1%
Community and Personal Service 352.8 32.0%
Clerical and Administrative Workers 415.6 24.6%
Sales Workers 390.2 37.3%
Machinery Operators and Drivers 675.6 91.4%
Labourers 751.2 64.3%
Total, all occupations 6261.5 54.3%
Females
Occupation group/
workers No. % Persons
Employed Full-time
Managers 402.7 30.7% 1310.2
Professionals 877.3 45.0% 1950.5
Technicians & Trades 133.2 9.2% 1448.9
Community and Personal Service 282.3 56.3% 501.8
Clerical & Administrative 768.5 68.3% 1125.1
Sales W 196.9 44.9% 438.8
Machinery Operators and Drivers 42.2 6.6% 643.1
Labourers 153.7 23.4% 657.6
Total, all occupations 2856.8 35.4% 8076.0
Employed Part-time
Managers 124.8 62.1% 200.9
Professionals 477.9 75.1% 636.7
Technicians and Trades 102.4 41.4% 247.4
Community and Personal Service 468.8 77.9% 602.1
Clerical & Administrative 502.8 89.5% 561.7
Sales 458.2 75.6% 606.4
Machinery Operators and Drivers 21.7 22.5% 96.4
Labourers 262.7 51.5% 509.8
Total, all occupations 2419.2 69.9% 3461.4
Employed Full-time or Part-time
Managers 527.5 34.9% 1511.1
Professionals 1355.2 52.4% 2587.2
Technicians and Trades 235.7 13.9% 1696.2
Community and Personal Service 751.1 68.0% 1103.9
Clerical and Administrative Workers 1271.3 75.4% 1686.9
Sales Workers 655.0 62.7% 1045.2
Machinery Operators and Drivers 63.9 8.6% 739.5
Labourers 416.3 35.7% 1167.5
Total, all occupations 5275.9 45.7% 11537.4
Source: ABS, Labour Force, Australia, Detailed--Electronic Delivery,
June 2013, Catalogue no. 6291.0.55.001, Australian Bureau of
Statistics, Canberra.
These data indicate that women are under-represented as full-time
managers and professionals but are over-represented as part-time
managers and professionals. With respect to community and personal
service workers, clerical and administrative workers and sales workers,
women represent the majority of workers (either full-time or part-time
in these occupations). It is interesting to compare these data with the
earnings and hours data; however, any real analysis is prevented as the
data shown in Table 3 above cannot be further disaggregated into
individual occupations.
REMUNERATION OF AUSTRALIAN FEMALE SENIOR EXECUTIVES
Before considering the Australian data in more detail, one study
conducted outside of Australia was by Kulich, Trojanowski, Ryan, Haslam
and Renneboog (2011) who looked at the remuneration of 192 male and
female executive directors of firms listed on the London Stock Exchange.
Their analysis confirmed that gender inequality in remuneration existed
mainly due to variable remuneration in the form of performance bonuses.
These bonuses were larger when compared between men and women and in
addition the percentage of total remuneration that was performance based
was higher for men than it was for women. So there was inequality of
remuneration on two levels. As these authors conclude, despite years and
even decades of anti-discrimination legislation (such as in Australia)
in the area of remuneration there are still differences in remuneration
levels between men and women. It is interesting to note that the boards
of most Australian listed corporations are composed predominantly of
non-executive directors rather than executive directors (required by the
corporate governance requirements set out in the ASX listing rules),
with the one exception being the chief executive officer or managing
director of the corporation. Given that these directors are
non-executive, their remuneration is usually a fixed amount allocated
from a fixed pool of funds; in most cases there is no variable or
performance-based component in the remuneration of these non-executive
directors and so it would be expected that greater equality of
remuneration should occur for men and women occupying these positions.
The analysis provided below is based on data disclosed in 2012
Remuneration Reports of directors and senior executives as required
under Accounting Standard AASB 1046 'Director and Executive
Disclosures by Disclosing Entities' for corporations listed on the
Australian Securities Exchange (AASB, 2004). This standard requires the
relevant companies to disclose remuneration for all company directors
(executive and non-executive) as well as at least the top five
executives within the corporation. The companies selected for analysis
are from the ASX-100 index of the top 100 listed companies, and so can
all be considered significant with many of these companies being
household names within Australia. Table 5 provides an analysis of the
positions held by both men and women in these corporations for 2012.
Of all the companies listed above there was only one female chief
executive officer (WESTPAC) and only two companies where the chairman of
the board was a female (QBE Insurance and Telstra). In terms of senior
management or executive positions within these corporations, only 12% of
these positions were held by women in 2012. In many cases, when looking
at the position title held by these women executives, their positions
were mainly concentrated in areas such as head of human resources,
public relations and communications rather across all activities
undertaken by the corporation, such as general management or operational
roles. With respect to non-executive directors, only 25% of these
positions were held by women in 2012. Across all senior management or
senior executive categories, only 17% of these positions were held by
women in 2012.
Table 6 below analyses the remuneration paid to senior management
or senior executives for 2012.
As can be seen, remuneration for women across most companies is
less than that paid to men. There are exceptions such as chief executive
officers and chairmen of company boards but for these categories there
are very few women who have been given these roles. Indeed, as indicated
in Table 5, the number of women working in these sorts of positions is
still very few and so the analysis is somewhat confounded by the
presence of the scarcity of these data. For the manager and
non-executive director categories these data are less sparse. However,
Table 6 shows a number of companies which disclosed no data on their
women senior executives, indicating that these women employees have not
yet reached the threshold for disclosure and so are still considered
less important than their male counterparts. Where data are disclosed
for senior women executives, many companies still pay these executives
less than their male counterparts although whether these senior
executives undertake work of equal or comparable value is possibly open
to question given the concentration of women senior executives in
certain discipline areas. This is surely not the case when considering
non-executive directors of these companies, as the main requirement of
these people is to provide independent advice into high level strategic
decision making. As shown in Table 6, the difference between
remuneration levels between men and women non-executive directors is not
less than for the 'Manager' category, but the data still
indicate that male non-executive directors are paid on average 10% more
than their female counterparts.
DISCUSSION: IMPLICATIONS FOR REDUCING THE REMUNERATION GAP
The analysis presented above, from a range of different sources,
indicates that there is still inequality of remuneration between
Australian men and women workers. Even when overall aggregates are
disaggregated, such as between full-time and part-time work, the
difference remains and to some extent appears to be entrenched. When
looking at the occupation data presented, inequality still exists across
most occupations where there are very few cases (based on May 2012 data)
in which women actually earn more than men based on average weekly cash
earnings. Finally, given the analysis for remuneration of senior
executives in ASX-listed companies, it may be that inequality in
remuneration between men and women is not purely a discrimination issue
between the genders but more an organisational culture issue in which
women are seen as equal but more suited to occupying only certain
positions within an organisation, such as human resources, marketing,
public relations and communication, rather than in operational positions
which are often perceived as more important.
LIMITATIONS OF THE CURRENT RESEARCH
Haslam, Ryan, Kulich, Trojanowski and Atkins (2010) completed a
study of those corporations listed on the London stock exchange and
included in the FTSE top 100 index for the years 2001 to 2005. These
authors found that those companies with women on their boards did not
perform as well as companies with all male boards in terms of subjective
stock-based performance measures, although all more objective measures
showed no discernible difference in performance. The authors concluded
that women directors are more likely to be appointed to poorly
performing firms and so may face more difficult circumstances in which
they can improve their remuneration. The analysis presented for
Australian senior executives is for the 2012 financial year and so a
broader analysis may have revealed similar findings to the study of
London stock exchange-listed firms. Furthermore, more detailed analysis
of the components of remuneration would have allowed a better
understanding of how inequality emerges. For example, it may be found
that in terms of fixed remuneration there is no difference between men
and women, but when considering variable or performance based
remuneration there are significant differences. This will be the focus
of further research.
CONCLUSION
This paper conducted a review of remuneration for Australian men
and women workers. This review considered the regulatory framework in
Australia that attempts to address unequal remuneration and it revealed
a significant history in which many attempts had been made, particularly
at the federal level of government, to ensure equality of remuneration
for Australian men and women workers. However, using time series data
that includes figures for 2012 and 2013, the analysis revealed that no
significant improvement towards equality had occurred over a number of
decades. Other data analysed looked at average weekly cash-based
earnings by occupation by gender. It was found that in a large majority
of occupations inequality of remuneration between men and women still
exists which is somewhat mystifying as it would be expected that people
working in the same occupation would be undertaking work of equal or
comparable value. Remuneration data for senior executives were also
analysed for ASX-listed corporations for the financial year 2012; it was
found that inequality of remuneration still exists and there is an
under-representation of women at senior levels within these
corporations. So it would appear that there is still a way to go before
equality of remuneration in Australia becomes a reality.
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Table 1: Average Weekly Cash Earnings, May 2012
Collective Individual
Item Award only agreement arrangement
Males
Full-time employees 923.20 1,633.50 1,624.90
Part-time employees 438.40 573.10 628.60
All employees 690.10 1,388.50 1,494.40
Females
Full-time employees 946.50 1,356.80 1,289.80
Part-time employees 443.40 623.90 561.40
All employees 592.70 954.60 1,001.00
Persons
Full-time employees 933.40 1,518.50 1,506.50
Part-time employees 441.80 610.80 581.30
All employees 633.80 1,150.80 1,277.20
Owner manager of
incorporated All methods of
Item enterprise setting pay
Males
Full-time employees 1,503.70 1,558.10
Part-time employees 920.80 553.90
All employees 1,451.10 1,342.50
Females
Full-time employees 1,245.90 1,278.40
Part-time employees 592.70 562.40
All employees 998.30 904.00
Persons
Full-time employees 1,455.70 1,452.00
Part-time employees 728.90 560.00
All employees 1,337.50 1,122.60
Source: ABS, Employee Earnings and Hours, May 2012,
Catalogue no. 6306.0, Australian Bureau of Statistics, Canberra.
Table 5: Executive Positions Held by Women in Major Australian
Corporations, 2012
Executive Category
CEO Chairman
Company F M % F F M % F
AGL 1 0% 1 0%
Amcor 1 0% 1 0%
AMP 1 0% 1 0%
CBA 1 0% 1 0%
Coca Cola Amatil 1 0% 1 0%
Cochlear 1 0% 1 0%
CSL 1 0% 1 0%
Fortescue Metals Group 1 0% 1 0%
Fairfax Media 1 0% 1 0%
IAG 1 0% 1 0%
JB Hi-fi 1 0% 1 0%
Newcrest Mining 1 0% 1 0%
Orica 2 0% 1 0%
QANTAS 1 0% 1 0%
QBE Insurance 2 0% 1 100%
SANTOS 1 0% 1 0%
Telstra 1 0% 1 100%
Woolworths 2 0% 1 0%
WESTPAC 1 100% 2 0%
Woodside 1 0% 1 0%
Total, All Companies 1 22 4% 2 19 10%
Executive Category
Managers Non-Exec Directors
Company F M % F F M % F
AGL 5 0% 2 4 33%
Amcor 5 0% 2 6 25%
AMP 1 8 11% 3 5 38%
CBA 2 8 20% 3 6 33%
Coca Cola Amatil 1 5 17% 2 5 29%
Cochlear 5 0% 1 4 20%
CSL 3 8 27% 2 6 25%
Fortescue Metals Group 4 0% 12 0%
Fairfax Media 2 3 40% 2 5 29%
IAG 1 6 14% 2 3 40%
JB Hi-fi 5 0% 1 5 17%
Newcrest Mining 1 9 10% 1 5 17%
Orica 1 5 17% 1 6 14%
QANTAS 1 5 17% 3 7 30%
QBE Insurance 1 11 8% 2 5 29%
SANTOS 7 0% 1 6 14%
Telstra 1 7 13% 2 8 20%
Woolworths 3 8 27% 3 6 33%
WESTPAC 1 12 8% 3 6 33%
Woodside 8 0% 2 5 29%
Total, All Companies 19 134 12% 38 115 25%
Executive Category
Total
Company F M % F
AGL 2 11 15%
Amcor 2 13 13%
AMP 4 15 21%
CBA 5 16 24%
Coca Cola Amatil 3 12 20%
Cochlear 1 11 8%
CSL 5 16 24%
Fortescue Metals Group 0 18 0%
Fairfax Media 4 10 29%
IAG 3 11 21%
JB Hi-fi 1 12 8%
Newcrest Mining 2 16 11%
Orica 2 14 13%
QANTAS 4 14 22%
QBE Insurance 4 18 18%
SANTOS 1 15 6%
Telstra 4 16 20%
Woolworths 6 17 26%
WESTPAC 5 20 20%
Woodside 2 15 12%
Total, All Companies 60 290 17%
Table 6: Average Remuneration by Senior Manager and Executive
Categories, 2012
Executive Category
CEO Chairman
Company F M F M
$ ('000s)
AGL 6,286 420
Amcor 7,452 696
AMP 5,463 601
CBA 5,676 831
Coca Cola Amatil 7,956 452
Cochlear 2,081 453
CSL 7,686 443
Fortescue Metals Group 3,014 165
Fairfax Media 2,019 432
IAG 4,923 755
JB Hi-fi 1,170 162
Newcrest Mining 3,695 600
Orica 4,808 528
QANTAS 5,577 611
QBE Insurance 7,292 736
SANTOS 5,936 496
Telstra 7,696 684
Woolworths 4,319 678
WESTPAC 9,591 512
Woodside 7,297 751
Average, All Companies 9,591 5,307 710 531
Executive Category
Non-executive
Managers Directors
Company F M F M
$ ('000s)
AGL 1,442 210 204
Amcor 3,120 176 210
AMP 1,629 2,055 335 314
CBA 1,574 4,055 295 294
Coca Cola Amatil 2,082 1,131 200 191
Cochlear 778 196 193
CSL 1,130 1,650 352 207
Fortescue Metals Group 2,778 92
Fairfax Media 614 620 190 243
IAG 1,960 1,977 229 240
JB Hi-fi 439 131 128
Newcrest Mining 1,506 1,399 240 257
Orica 1,140 1,737 255 232
QANTAS 1,025 1,872 250 231
QBE Insurance 953 1,666 328 250
SANTOS 1,081 213 189
Telstra 2,770 2,822 273 271
Woolworths 983 2,605 265 320
WESTPAC 1,900 3,428 302 347
Woodside 2,246 157 305
Average, All Companies 1,352 2,073 253 230
