Women tend to be at a financial disadvantage to men because of career breaks or because they choose to do more in unpaid work, but this is not the full story. Economic inequality starts early with gender gaps for after-school jobs and graduate salaries, and then widens the longer a woman stays in the workforce and into retirement.

While an evolution of the workforce is underway, bigger ideas are needed to fast track economic equality in the school system, the workforce, society and at home. Financy Women’s Index (FWX) lists ten big ideas that would make a transformational impact in the quest for financial equality in Australia. These ideas are the result of brainstorming efforts by the FWX advisory panel and economic Security4Women – the National Women's Alliance that BPW Australia established and continues to support.

A new report from the Centre for Future Work at the Australia Institute examines the changing landscape of university-to-employment transitions in Australia. The authors report that over her career, the median female graduate will earn over $600,000 more than the median female with no post-school qualifications. Male graduates enjoy a larger graduate earnings premium over their lifetime, at around $790,000 more than males without non-school qualifications. The Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA). data for 2016 shows that a bachelor’s degree increases individual earnings by 56% for men and 38% for women, compared with attainment of Year 11 or below.

To some extent this can be attributed to technology: the rapid evolution in the scope, capacities, and employment impacts of new innovations like artificial intelligence, advanced robotics, and big data analysis. But other disruptive forces at work include dramatic changes in work organisation, business models and employment relationships in the context of global structural change: demographic, environmental and globalisation. Given that technology is neither neutral nor uncontrollable, shifting focus to the social and institutional influences on the world of work, and the collective capacity of society to regulate and shape that world, empowers society to take the future of work more actively into its own hands.

McKinsey’s Women in the Workplace 2019 report identifies that the biggest obstacle women face on the path to senior leadership is at the first step up to manager. For every 100 men promoted to manager, only 72 women are promoted. This broken rung at the first step up to manager is the biggest obstacle that women face on the path to leadership.  It results in more women getting stuck at the entry level and fewer women becoming managers, so men end up holding 62% percent of manager-level positions.

This early inequality has a long-term impact on the talent pipeline. Since male managers significantly outnumber women, the number of women decreases at each subsequent level. So it’s impossible for women to climb fast enough to catch up. But fixing the broken rung could add one million more women to management in corporate America over the next 3 years.

Sheryl Sandberg, LeanIn.Org founder and COO, and Rachel Thomas, LeanIn.Org president, state that the broken rung is not attributable to women pausing careers to take care of children or to gender differences in ambition – it’s simply bias.

Essays on Equality is a new publication from the Global Institute for Women’s Leadership. Written by GIWL researchers, members of the Advisory Council and leading researchers and campaigners, this essay collection provides research-informed reflections on the fight for women’s equality.  Although it tends to be UK-centric, they offer practical solutions to help create a fairer, more equal world.

The foreword by Julia Gillard, CEO of the GIWL, is followed by short opinion pieces by expert writers including

·         Former Prime Minister of New Zealand Helen Clark, who reminds us that we all gain from gender equality, so it is everyone’s responsibility.

·         Senior Research Fellow Dr Rose Cook who questions whether the huge growth in diversity and inclusion activities, and the millions invested in them, is actually making a difference.

·         Professor Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic explains that by mistaking confidence and charisma for competence, we end up with poorer leaders and fewer women at the top.

·         Research Associate Emma Kinloch who tackles the thorny issue of Brexit, critiquing the ways in which women have been excluded or undermined during the UK’s negotiations for a deal with the EU.

·         Professor Iris Bohnet, Academic Dean of Harvard’s Kennedy School, and colleagues on what venture capitalists could learn from orchestra directors who have combatted gender bias through blind recruitment processes.

·         Research Associate Laura Jones who argues more fundamental structural and cultural changes are needed to make workplaces fairer.

·         Diva Dhar from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation who examines the gap in unpaid care work, which she argues must be better analysed and researched.

·         Sam Smethers, Chief Executive of the Fawcett Society, who argues expanding gender pay gap reporting, equalising parental leave and mandating flexible working could drive real progress in improving women’s working lives.

In Australia, many parents with young children rely on childcare to enable them to fulfil their working commitments. While parents may rely on a particular type of childcare, it cannot be assumed that it represents their preferred option. This is just one of many areas where women's compromises are misinterpreted as women's choices.

Researchers at the Centre for Independent Studies report that 2/3 of working mothers said they would like the option of using subsidies they receive for formal childcare to instead help subsidise informal childcare – even if it meant receiving a lower subsidy overall.   Mothers identified their most important priorities in selecting childcare as warmth of care-giving, location and cost/affordability.  

The research highlights a misalignment of priorities for childcare between governments and parents. Mothers tend to prioritise the wellbeing of their children, as indicated by nominating ‘warmth of care-giving’ as their most important priority. The other top priorities relate to practical considerations of cost and location rather than the regulated ‘quality’ aspects of childcare, as indicated by staff credentials and early learning.

Experienced Board member Nicole Donegan, CEO of Women on Boards, has learned that a great CV doesn’t always translate to a great interview for a Board role. She advises that your CV may get your foot in the interview door, but the clincher to your success will be your ability to interview well for the position.

Her top preparation tips before an interview include: reviewing the requirements in the ad and researching the organisational strategies and directions; being thoroughly prepared to promote your relevant skills and provide examples to demonstrate these; keeping your responses to questions at strategic board level, not operational level; and relating your responses to how you will add value to the organisation rather than your own professional development.

Until 1994, no Australian woman was allowed to list their legal status as "farmer". Instead, women on the land were officially defined as unproductive "silent partners", "domestics", "helpmates", or even "farmers' wives". That was only 25 years ago.

This impacted on the tax paid by farming families.  I recall a family on the Eyre Peninsula where he was the local chemist and she was a farmer, but the tax department attributed her farm income to her husband because a woman couldn’t be recognised as a farmer. 

BPW Australia had many rural clubs at the time, so we lobbied the federal government to recognise that women who owned or managed farms must be recognised as farmers for all government purposes.  This change was achieved, but women farmers remain invisible.

To address this, the Australian Research Council has funded a 3 year study called Invisible Farmer which involves a nation-wide partnership between rural communities, academics, government and cultural organisations. The project aims to create new histories of rural Australia, reveal the hidden stories of women on the land, recognise the diverse, innovative and vital role of women in agriculture and stimulate public discussions about contemporary issues facing rural Australia and its future.

Journalist and author Annabel Crabb’s new Quarterly Essay titled “Men At Work: Australia’s Parenthood Trap”, she highlights the contrasting reactions to New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison both juggling their roles as parents.  She questions the way male leaders are treated compared to their female counterparts, asking: why do we accept that fathers will be absent? Why are female leaders being asked how they juggle their roles when key male figures with small children are never asked about it?

In her earlier book [The Wife Drought: Why Women Need Wives and Men Need Lives], Annabel observed that feminism had fundamentally changed the way women conduct their lives. But for men, nothing had changed. They still operated in precisely the same manner: marrying, having children and trotting off to work according to the 9-to-5 demands of business and for the most part enjoying better pay and conditions than their wives or female colleagues. She argued men would benefit enormously from spending more time with the children instead of missing out on this precious time.

In her latest work Annabel argues gender equity cannot be achieved “until men are as free to leave the workplace (when their lives demand it) as women are to enter it”. Women have benefited from the sentiment that ‘girls can do anything,’ then surely we should ensure that ‘boys can do anything’ means everything from home to work.

At current rates of progress, the World Economic Forum predicts it may take another 202 years to close the economic gender gap globally. Although many countries are well-placed to maximize women’s economic potential, they are failing to reap the returns from their investment in female education. In addition, too few countries are preparing to meet the challenges and harness the gender parity opportunities posed by the changing nature of work.

The Closing the Gender Gap report notes the need to look at gender discrimination, address pay transparency and consider targets and quotas for women in leadership positions – which correlate with BPW Australia resolutions and policies.

The project aims to create global and national public-private collaboration platforms to address current gender gaps and reshape gender parity for the future by:

National action: The Forum serves as an accelerator for national task forces, which successfully address current gender gaps and reshaping gender parity for the future in 12 countries. Focus is on closing gaps in labour force participation, remuneration and leadership, and preparing companies and countries for gender parity in the future of work.

Business commitments: The project calls for quantifiable commitments from leading companies to increase workforce opportunities and accelerate gender parity in the future of work.

Global exchange: The project has established an informal global community of practice of relevant leaders and experts for global knowledge exchange on closing the gender gap.

WGEA Director Libby Lyons sets the record straight: Equal pay is the right that Australian women won in 1969 to be paid the same as men for doing the same work or work of equal or comparable value. Prior to this landmark decision, men had the right to be paid 25% more than woman. Within organisations, unequal pay is sometimes referred to as a “like-for-like” pay gap.

The gender pay gap, on the other hand, measures the difference between the average earnings of women and men in the workforce at an organisation, industry or national level, which is expressed as a percentage of men’s earnings. It is caused by a range of social and economic factors that combine to reduce women’s earning capacity over their lifetime.

When an organisation announces they have closed their gender pay gap because they are now paying women and men the same amount for doing the same work or work of equal or comparable value, they have not actually closed their gender pay gap. What they have done is close their “like-for-like” pay gaps. So while that is good, these companies should not expect a pat on the back from the Workplace Gender Equality Agency or anyone else for meeting their requirements under the law.