Greens go into bat on pay gap
The gender pay gap does exist but if the Green Party is included in the next Government, it promises to close that ‘‘chasm’’.
On Thursday morning, Green Party leader James Shaw and spokesperson for women Jan Logie stood next to the bustling Wellington train station.
They were surrounded by women starting their day. Some stopped to don purple sashes with the words ‘‘equal pay for women’’.
While it was a noisy location for a media conference there was a reason: the spot is steeped in the history of New Zealand’s ‘‘most badass suffragette’’.
Kate Sheppard led the New Zealand suffrage movement, which was successful in getting Kiwi women the vote.
Nearby is Kate Sheppard St, Kate Sheppard traffic signals, and down the road is He Tohu - the exhibition including the 1893 Women’s Suffrage Petition, signed by one in four Kiwi women at the time. ‘‘New Zealand does have an incredible history as the first country in the world where women successfully won the right to vote,’’ Shaw said.
The Greens wanted to honour that history by making New Zealand the first country to achieve pay equity. ‘‘All around us there are thousands of women making their way to work.
‘‘But far too many of them are going to jobs where they are paid less just because they are women.’’
Women should be paid fairly for the work they did and the reason they weren’t was sexism, he said.
There is still a belief by many that the gender pay gap is a myth. While a discussion with almost any working woman would likely put that belief to bed, in this case numbers speak louder than words.
It is important to note the pay gap is not a fixed statistic experienced by every woman. It shrinks and grows depending on other things such as race, industry and geography.
According to New Zealand’s Ministry for Women, the gender pay gap is ‘‘a high-level indicator of the difference between women and men’s earnings’’.
It compares the median hourly earnings of women and men in full and part-time work. In 1998, the gender pay gap was 16 per cent. Last year, it was 12 per cent. This year, it is sitting at 9.4 per cent, the biggest drop since 1998.
However, for average hourly earning the gap is 13.1 per cent. For Maori women it is 24.5 per cent, and for Pasifika women it is 26.8 per cent.
And it’s not just an issue with jobs considered to be ‘‘women’s work’’, like midwifery and care support workers.
Male chartered accountants earn an average of $45,000 a year more than their female counterparts; even when factoring in things like experience and work hours. Male engineers’ median salaries are 18.8 per cent higher than female engineers.
If the Green Party is successful in becoming part of the next government, it would introduce pay transparency, by requiring all employers to collect data on what they pay men and women.
It would also amend the equal pay laws, to include agreed principles and place the onus on employers to prove they are paying women fairly. Logie said public sector chief executives would be required to achieve pay equity for all employees in core government departments by 2020.