NewAfricanWoman Issue 49 - Flipbook - Page 18
WOMEN & WORK | SPECIAL FEATURE
What is the state of the pay gap?
The effect of COVID
One of the five pillars of data excellence on which
companies are judged is “equal pay & gender pay
parity.” The average score for this pillar, determined via multiple metrics, was 64% this year,
compared to 61% in 2022.
However, it is noteworthy that the rate of voluntary data disclosure for information regarding the
pay gap is still significantly lagging compared
to the rest of the data submitted for the index.
Companies with a woman CEO generally fared
the best in this category. Bloomberg found that,
on average, the mean gender pay gap is 50%
lower in companies with women CEOs than those
without.
It also found that corporations with more women
executives are more likely to conduct a gender
based compensation review to understand the
gender gap in pay. The companies who undertake this type of assessment on a yearly basis
tend to have more success narrowing the gender
pay gap.
The index also suggested that COVID and its
myriad knock-on effects has amplified existing
disparities in the workplace and has had a significant impact on the place of women in business.
The burden of childcare and eldercare on primary
caregivers, a role which primarily falls to women,
increased over the course of the pandemic and
will have been doubly challenging for those who
also worked from home.
Additionally, women made up a majority of the
employees on the frontline and were overrepresented in the industries that have faced the greatest financial impacts from COVID.
In the United States [for example], over one
million women have left the workforce, and
women accounted for 63.9% of the 2.9 million
job losses in the US between February 2020 and
2022. However, others suggest that the increased
ability and acceptance of working from home
has evened the playing field for women, by
making it easier to parent and work at the same
time. Of course, this idea reflects the fact that
many women will either have to balance their
job with their role as a primary caregiver or make
the cliché choice between having a family and
having a career.
18 l New African Woman l March 2023
Photography:Shutterstock/ManopBoonpeng
In 2022, the World Economic
Forum (WEF) noted that the
overall gender gap across
the domains of politics,
work, health and education
will now take 132 years to
reach full parity.