Co-chair of government review says BBC women let pay gap happen
Sir Philip Hampton, co-author of the UK government's Hampton-Alexander Review, which is looking at ways of increasing women’s representation on FTSE 350 boards, said, when asked about the pay gap at the BBC by London’s Evening Standard newspaper, “I suspect they let it happen because they weren't doing much about it.”
The BBC faced criticism last week when it revealed that its top earners are largely men, with the top-paid male star—Chris Evans—paid four times the salary of Claudia Winkleman, the highest-paid female talent. The BBC’s Director General, Tony Hall, admitted there was “more to do” at the corporation on the gender pay gap.
BBC Woman’s Hour presenter Jane Garvey, a prominent campaigner for pay parity, said Sir Philip Hampton appeared “peculiarly out of touch” given his role heading the government-commissioned review.
Aside from his controversial comments, Hampton said it was “healthy” that the BBC now talked more openly about pay, and called for greater transparency in order to tackle inequality in pay between the sexes in other organizations.
Women’s hesitance to ask for pay rises and a lack of assertiveness in putting themselves forward for promotions are common explanations for the persistence of the gender wage gap. However, a study published in 2016 seemingly debunks this claim, finding that women are just as likely to ask for a pay increase as men, but are less likely to get one.
The study’s co-author, Amanda Goodall, notes more positively that, “Young women today are negotiating their pay and conditions more successfully than older females, and perhaps that will continue as they become more senior.”
Mario Lackner, in his article for IZA World of Labor, writes that differences in attitudes towards competition offer another explanation as to why women are globally under-represented in top-level jobs. “Gender differences in competitiveness are formed early on in childhood and are relatively persistent, exerting a profound influence on an individual’s future career.” He goes on to suggest that “obvious policy measures, such as quotas for certain job positions and job types, might not be the most efficient way to enact affirmative action policies to close the gender gap. Any fundamental policy measure designed to address this specific gender gap should be targeted directly at early childhood education, as well as the primary and secondary education systems in general.”
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