Gender pay gap will stay till 2069
The gender pay gap in the UK will not close until 2069 based on current salary progression, research suggests.
Account anc y f irm Deloitte said the hourly pay gap between men and women of 9.4 per cent, or about £1.30, was narrowing by just two- and- a- half pence a year.
They also found men were paid more than women at the start of their careers.
They said more females should be encouraged into science and technology jobs, where salaries are more balanced, but women make up just 14.4 per cent of the workforce.
The Deloitte analysis, based on data from the Office for National Statistics, found women earn an average of eight per cent less in graduate starting salaries than their male counterparts across science, technology, engineering and mathematics subjects combined.
This compares with nine per cent less across all other industries.
Among those professions with the most-pronounced difference was health care, where women earned £ 24,000 on average in graduate starting salaries, with £28,000 for men.
Deloitte’s Emma Codd said: “A great deal of progress has been made in the past half century but we should not wait another 53 years for full parity.”
The UK Government said: “The gender pay gap is the lowest on record but we are committed to eliminating it in a generation.”