What is Equal Pay Day? 2024

Equal Pay Day is recognised globally and each specific date may be different due to the size of the #GenderPayGap in different countries.

It's the day when women, on average, effectively stop earning relative to men because of the gender pay gap.

Count the days to the end of the year from 20^th November in the UK and that's how many days women are effectively working for nothing compared to men.

For Nothing!

I get more and more angry every year because the pernicious inequality of the #GenderPayGap is not improving enough or at a fast pace.

Have a look at my previous blogs!

2019 it was on November 14. (Dreadful)

2020 it was November 20 (Better)

2021 Equal Pay Day was November 28. (Even better)

2022 was 20 November. (Going backwards)

2023 was 22 November. (Tiny improvement)

We have not got out of November in 6 years and this year, women have another 2 days where they are not earning compared to men.

The Gender Pay Gap (GPG) in the UK drives the date of Equal Pay Day and, in April 2024, the UK's GPG for all employees was 13.1% less for women than for men. This is the median (middle) figure for all part-time and full-time employees. I think this is bad enough.

When we turn to the position in education, remember the report we did into schools in collaboration with NAHT, ASCL and NGA? This was the first exploration of such data and it's worth re-reading.

The Government's 2024 analysis includes many GPG bombs:

'a substantial gap emerges among full-time employees aged 40 and over. This links to parenthood - the gap between male and female hourly earnings grows gradually but steadily in the years after parents have their first child.'

'The causes of the gender pay gap are complex and varied. Direct discrimination plays a part in women's lower wages, particularly for older women who entered the labour market on less equal terms to men and who may face dual discrimination on the grounds of age and gender. However, structural factors are the key cause of the gender pay gap. These include occupational segregation; the part-time pay penalty; women's disproportionate responsibility for unpaid caring; and women's concentration in low-paid, highly feminised sectors.'

Which brings us to education, a highly feminised sector.

There may be some improvement in the full-time GPG as education is usually in the worst 3 sectors.

Oh dear I spoke too soon.

This is a shocking gap for part-time colleagues in education and we know most of them are women.

Isn't this discrimination?

And this final graph cements the issue for me.

In public education, the work of women is undervalued and under paid.

It was also reported this month that:

'The average pay gap at the 20 largest trusts was 32.3 per cent last year (meaning women are paid 67.7p to every £1 for men). It constitutes little progress on the 32.5 per cent gap in 2022 and 33 per cent in 2021.

Of the 100 public bodies with the largest pay gaps, 97 were trusts, analysis by The Guardian has found. This is in part because most of the lower-paid and often part-time roles in schools are done by women, as opposed to women in the same role as men simply being paid less.' (SchoolsWeek, 2024)

With our expertise in this aspect, WomenEd offered to support Trusts in reducing their GPG and one trust responded.

We would really like to work with more Trusts who want to show how much they value their female workforce.

Please can this be the year that women are no cheaper than men in education.

References

Fawcett (2024). Equal Pay Day 2024

ASCL, NAHT, NGA, WomenEd (2021)Closing the gender pay gap in Education

UK Parliament (2024) Research Briefings

The Guardian (2024) Gender pay gap in Great Britain smallest since reporting first enforced

SchoolsWeek (2024) Trusts struggling to close 'unacceptable' gender pay gap