Inequality and poverty in a gender pay gap approach

25th March was the Equal Pay Day in France. This day symbolizes the gender wage inequalities. It represents the overtime that women must work in order to equalize the pay of their male counterparts. French women must work three months (59 days) more than men to have the same income, salaries. The progress women made over the past century for more equality is clear: more women are running for office, they make up nearly half of the work force and are more likely than their male counterparts to attend college and earn professional degrees. But, how to explain that women are still only making 82% of what men are making in France and even less in almost the rest of the world? Why women are paid less than men for working the same job and the same time? How is it measured? Which measures are taken to counter it and to change the things? I will focus my analysis on Europe and particularly France.

Gender inequality in a wage dimension is better known as the gender pay gap. The gender pay gap is the gap between what men and women are paid. Commonly, if refers to the median annual pay of all women who work full time and year-round, compared to the pay of a similar cohort of men. It shows which percentage of the men income women earn.

The gender pay gap has been attributed to multiples explanations such as: women are more likely to leave the workforce to care their families or having to do with education. Gender and the family status are linked and a common explanation for the gender pay gap is the motherhood penalty, but also that women earn less than men because they devote more time to raising children. While this is without a doubt causes massive problems for women, it can’t fully explain wage disparities. A gender pay gap exists regardless of family status. Marriage has a bigger impact than children. Married women with or without kids earn less relative to their male counterparts than unmarried women with children aged 18 and under. Negotiating is sometimes presented as a cause of the gender pay gap. But it is not true that women are not asking for more money. Nevertheless, it is true that a different style for negotiating is adopted: it could be sometimes not completely clear. Or, it could be that women who request raises are seen as pushy while men are viewed as more assertive.

According to the French National Institute of Statistic and Economic Studies, job sectors and work time explain half of the gap^[1] From one sector to another, differences on pay gap are variable a lot, always on the disadvantage of women. The sexual repartition of jobs explains partially the pay gap. Women are overrepresented in low paid sectors whereas men are overrepresented in skilled worker sectors where remunerations are higher. High wage inequalities are important in the female-dominated sectors. Women have the most undervalued jobs. Moreover, the gender pay gap increase with the age. The income disparities with young people (< 25 years old women) rise to 22% while it raises to 29% for the 55 years old women and more. The most important wage disparities affect finance and insurance executives.

The gender pay gap is the result of many factors, including occupational segregation, bias against working mothers, and direct pay discrimination. Additionally, such things as racial bias, disability, access to education, and age come into play. Consequently, different groups of women experience very different gaps in pay.

Regarding direct discrimination, the “equal pay for equal work” principle is not applicated in all compagnies. Basically, it means that the employer must pay equally two employees doing the same job. But it is clear that the discrimination is still present (sex, ethnicity, nationality, race are discriminatory factors). For example, in France this principle is established in the Labor Law since 1948 but it is still often happening that a man and a woman don’t earn the same amount of money for the same job (same hours and tasks). The Labor Law supposed that the employees must have the same professional knowledge (diploma), capacities acquired from the experience and responsibilities. It also provides that it is prohibited for an employer to take into consideration the sex or pregnancy of an employee in order to take a measure related to pay. Nevertheless, a lot of differences can be seen in the salaries between men and women in the private sectors. And these differences become inequality in many cases because nothing justified clearly the difference of wage expect the sex factor. While there is explained and non-discriminatory factors that explain the difference of wage (level of education, years of service, professional position, skill level, night work, etc.), a part of this difference remains unjustified, unexplained.

The gender pay gap is one of the reasons why women are facing poverty in a more significant way than men^[2]. Wider trends in the lives of women influence income and family support in later life. These factors may contribute to middle aged women’s risk of poverty in retirement. A large part of the gender pay gap is caused by a concentration of women in part-time work and the fact that they do the lion’s share of unpaid caring (particularly at home). The gender wage gap is a significant contributing factor to women’s disproportionate experience of poverty: closing the gender gap would cut in half poverty rate of working women and their families. The gender factor combined with other is increasing the risk for women to be in a poverty situation. When women are single with children, they must they care of them, educated them, dedicate them a lot of time and work at the same time to have provide basic needs to the household. Single women are often obliged to have a part-time work or to face period of unemployment.

Poverty in France does not affect men and women differently according to age groups. The poverty rate among children is the same between girls and boys because it depends on the situation of the parents. The gap is widening for young adults. It is one point down for women aged 18 to 49. 13 per cent of women aged 18-29 and 8.2 per cent of women aged 30-49 (compared to 12.0 per cent of men aged 18-29 and 7.2 per cent of women aged 30-49, respectively^[3]) live below the poverty line at 50 per cent of the median standard of living. Women are more likely than men to head a single-parent family, with only a part-time allowance or salary as their sole source of income, which puts them at greater risk of falling into poverty. Indeed, women combine poverty, dependency on benefits and precariousness on the labor market^[4]. In the over 75 age group, many women are also single, due to the lower life expectancy of men, particularly among the poorest. Above all, they are more likely to have had periods of inactivity or not to have been in employment and therefore receive low pensions, a small survivor's pension or the minimum old-age pension.

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