On average, women in the European Union earn 13% less than their male counterparts, leading to the symbolic loss of pay starting on November 15th each year. This date is recognized as European Equal Pay Day, which aims to enhance awareness of the persistent gender pay disparity. According to the EU Commission, this imbalance equates to approximately one and a half months’ worth of salary annually.
Although there has been some advancement in recent years, including a 2.9 percentage point increase in women’s employment and a 1.5 percentage point reduction in the gender pay gap over the last five years, notable obstacles still exist. A significant issue is the lack of women’s representation in high-paying fields, particularly in technology and infrastructure. In 2024, women constituted merely 28.2% of the workforce in STEM fields, as reported by the World Economic Forum’s annual findings.
Highlighting wage inequality
Encouraging progress has been observed in the realm of AI engineering, with the proportion of female AI experts rising markedly over the past four years. Commissioners Věra Jourová, Nicolas Schmit, and Helena Dalli emphasized, “We have made significant progress in addressing gender imbalances.” They encourage Member States to fully adopt the Pay Transparency Directive, which is designed to promote pay transparency for job seekers, grant employees access to salary information, mandate reporting on the gender pay gap, and facilitate collaborative pay evaluations.
A further complication is the scarcity of childcare options and systems that support balancing work and personal obligations. The formal caregiving workforce is predominantly composed of women (90%), and there are 7.7 million women who are not employed due to the lack of adequate caregiving services. The European Union continues to grapple with promoting gender equality, yet initiatives and legislative actions are in progress to tackle these inequalities and assist women in attaining equitable wages for their contributions.
Although progress has been gradual, with only a 3-percentage point decrease in the gap since 2014, the EU is actively engaging in efforts to reconcile this pay disparity through new legislative measures and by ensuring proper oversight of their application.
