Progress towards closing the gender pay gap has stumbled over the past year, with the gap between men's and women's earnings widening to 12.8% over the year to April 2008 (external website), according to latest official figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), published today.
This compares with the 12.5% gender pay gap recorded for the year to April 2007, and is back in line with that recorded for April 2006 (12.8%) (subscription required).
These are among the key findings of the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) from ONS, which provides a comprehensive resource of benchmarking information for pay practitioners.
Median hourly earnings excluding overtime are the government's preferred measure for calculating the gender pay gap. The 12.8% gap as at April 2008 is based on male hourly earnings of £12.50, compared with £10.91 for women.
ONS ascribes the widening of the earnings gap to stronger growth in men's earnings: over the year to April 2008, men's hourly earnings excluding overtime rose by 4.4%, compared with 4.1% for men.
The 2008 ASHE data also reveal that median gross weekly earnings for full-time employees rose by 4.6% to £478.60 per week over the year to April 2008. By gender, the weekly earnings of women working full-time rose by 4.4% (to £412.00), compared with a 4.6% increase for men (to £521.20).
XpertHR's official pay data pages (subscription required) will be updated later this month to provide easily accessible pay benchmarking resources, including detailed earnings breakdowns by occupation, industry sector and geographical region.
In the meantime, concerned employers wishing to ensure that pay patterns within their own organisation are not following this shameful national trend are referred to XpertHR's new JobPricing service (powered by CELRE), which allows subscribing participants to see how men and women's pay compares within any one job family.
- Has your organisation recently carried out an annual pay review? If so, and if it has now been settled, please get in touch so that we can add your organisation's pay award to the IRS database.
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