What does European Union stands for? One always epitomizes it as an organization that’ll work towards the betterment, both at an individual and societal level. As one of its aim incorporates ‘promotion of economic & social progress and helping people earn enough money & get treated fairly.’ Is this actually taking place?

In 1970, Britain passed the Equal Pay Act, which gave women the legal right to be paid the same as men. But unfortunately ground realities show a different aspect.

In spite of the fact that 60 percent of European graduates are women- which means that women are on a higher altar than men in academics- they are being paid less for their part of work, comparatively. Graph depicting the gap in salaries earned by men and women has not deviated from its path rather, to the detriment of women, it has shown an upward trend. This indicates a widespread undervaluation of women in comparison with men, who dominate the work field.

Employers use productivity differences to justify higher wages of jobs:

One reason could be the trend of job segregation, which implies that there are particular job exclusively demarcated to women folks and if in case, both women and men are in similar occupation, then women would be offered a lower status and lower rewarded positions.

While according to the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) in Ireland,

About three-quarters of the gap between men’s and women’s hourly wages can be attributed to the fact that women, under current social and economic structures, typically spend less time in the labor market than men and more time as carers in the home.

Another view postulated by Lilja Mosesdottir, a professor of economics at Bifröst University is that the entering of low skilled women in the labor market has created a gap in the respective wages. She holds the view that women take up unskilled low- wage jobs and so when the number of low skilled women increases in the labor market, the gender pay gap increases.

Now, there’s one more point which is usually put forward by the employers (quite misleading in my opinion). They attribute the pay package by measuring (individual) productivity of their staff, especially in knowledge based jobs, which is nearly impossible to evaluate because the output is in the form of service or knowledge, which cannot be measured quantitatively.

Is there any valid reason why the ‘person in command’ offer less salary to women folk who are working for the same set goal at the same level with their fellow men workers.

Gender prejudice is all pervasive:

Discrimination on the work fronts must be treated as punishable offense. Not only is it debasing but also undignified for a winning woman who knows she is as competent as her male counterpart is.

Women have taken long strides and have been through many testimonials in order to prove their efficacy towards work along with their household chores, yet this gender prejudice especially regarding pay and incentives is all pervasive.

Can anybody explain?