British women “work for free from today until end of the year”

Today is “Equal Pay Day” in the UK—the date from which campaigners estimate that women will effectively work for free until the end of the year, due to the country’s gender pay gap.

The date of November 9 is based on figures from the UK’s Office for National Statistics, which show that on average women working full-time earn 14.2% less than men.

Equal Pay Day this year comes five days later than in 2014, as the pay gap has narrowed slightly.

Gender equality charity the Fawcett Society estimates that at the current rate it will take another 50 years for the pay gap to close entirely. It cites a range of factors causing the pay gap including differences in caring responsibilities, clustering in low-skilled and low-paid work, and discrimination.

In an article for IZA World of Labor, Solomon Polachek looks at what governments can do to close the gender pay gap. Noting that the gap is already decreasing in many countries because of demographic changes, he argues that “economic policies that promote even greater lifetime work for women can successfully reduce the gender wage gap further.”

Lawrence Kahn has also written for us about the wage compression and the gender pay gap. Observing that pay systems that compress occupational wage differentials—such as the minimum wage—can reduce women’s incentives to enter male-dominated occupations, he argues that: “Policies to reduce occupational gender segregation and career interruptions by women may narrow the gender pay gap without the adverse employment effects of wage compression.”

Read more on this story at International Business Times.

Related articles:
Wage compression and the gender pay gap by Lawrence M. Kahn
Equal pay legislation and the gender wage gap by Solomon W. Polachek