Secretary-Treasurer Tosato's Message: Pay Equity & Closing the Pay Gap

Secretary-Treasurer’s Message

Kelly Tosato

Pay Equity & Closing the Pay Gap

In early March, the Union took part in several events to mark International Women’s Day, which is celebrated on March 8. The theme for 2019 is #BalanceForBetter, which brings focus to the challenges and benefits of creating gender balance throughout the world. That means making sure there’s gender balance throughout leadership, government, employees, media, and more.

It also means making sure that your rate of pay is not determined by your gender. Part of achieving that balance requires ongoing work to close the gender pay gap.

Depending on how calculations are done, the current gender pay gap is anywhere from 14% to 30% in Canada 1 . That means women, on average, are making between 70 cents and 86 cents for every dollar made by a man.

We’ve made some progress, albeit slow, from where we started, but the gap remains worse for Indigenous women, trans women, women with disabilities, immigrant women, and racialized women.

One of several factors leading to the gap in wages is a lack of pay equity across many sectors and industries.

Like many aspects of our economic and social worlds, inequities in pay and employment are linked to deeply embedded discriminatory beliefs and practices, many of which continue today.

Jobs that have traditionally been filled by females tend to be undervalued even though many involve skills similar or greater than those required in male-dominated jobs. Employees in the undervalued jobs, including men sometimes, get paid less. Over time, those already lower-valued jobs see fewer and smaller wage increases than more traditionally male jobs, resulting in further inequity – an increasing gap – between those rates of pay.

Fighting back against these practices and achieving more equitable pay is an important part of levelling the playing field for women. This includes pursuing special wage adjustments for our members. In the health care sector, for example, we often have to argue to achieve equitable raises in an industry that still finds itself embedded in the historical undervaluing of nursing care.

Pay equity is a complicated endeavour that takes time to calculate and correct. The Union has trained a number of staff specifically to deal with employers regarding pay equity issues. Many of the Members’ collective agreements include pay equity language or letters of understanding, but determining how to achieve pay equity can take time and is different for each workplace.

Another benefit of having a Union collective agreement is that, while we continue to address pay equity issues, we also establish language to help ensure job postings are open to all workers based on skill and seniority – not based on favourites. And if those job filling procedures aren’t followed, workers can use the grievance procedure to have their arguments heard.

Equitable hiring and promotion practices are an integral part of ensuring we achieve better balance across many aspects of employment.

In April, your Union alongside other activists will mark Equal Pay Day. This is the day on the calendar that the average woman’s wages catch up to what a man made in the previous year. That’s about 15.5 months to make what a man makes in 12. Equality and balance is about ensuring that every person regardless of gender has the same opportunities to access jobs and skills training, receive fair wages, and be treated with respect and dignity throughout.

The world began celebrating International Women’s Day in 1911 but the struggle to bring gender balance to the world didn’t start with that day and won’t end with just one day of work a year. Activists, including women and allies in the labour movement and beyond, have been fighting for their fare share for a long time now and will continue to do so as long as imbalance exists.

In Solidarity, Kelly Tosato

treasurer@ufcw175.com