Stats Terri MacDonald
Gender & higher education stats 2020
Policy & Research Officer
According to the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA), Australia’s national gender pay gap as of August 2020 is 14%, reflecting that, on average, women need to work an additional 59 days to earn the same as male counterparts. The gender pay gap (GPG) favours men across all industries and all levels of the workforce (highest in financial services, real estate and construction), and the full-time average weekly earnings for women are $253.60 less than for men.
Education and the gender pay gap Of all women aged 20-24, 91.1% have attained year 12 qualifications or above, compared to 88.8% of men in the same age bracket. Of all women aged 25-29, 44.5% have achieved a bachelor degree or above, compared to 32.2% of similarlyaged men. Women represent 58.7% of domestic students in universities or other institutions. This has risen from 57.6% in 2007.
Higher education workforce For those working in tertiary education the total remuneration pay gap is half that for all industries. Our sector is 58% women and 42% men, compared to 50/50 for all industries.
Graduate gender pay gap The 2020 Graduate Outcomes Survey has found that high level undergraduate labour market outcomes are broadly similar for males and females, with the notable exception that female graduates earn less than male graduates. In 2017, the gender gap in graduate median salaries was $2,600 or 4.3%. In 2020, for the same cohort of graduates three years later, the gender gap in graduate median salaries had increased to $6,900 or 9.4%. Previous research suggests that one of the key factors contributing to the gender gap in salaries is that females tend to graduate from fields of education that achieve lower salaries (e.g. Creative Arts) whereas males tend to graduate from more highly remunerated fields (e.g. Engineering).
However, female graduates often earn less than male graduates within the While higher education is same field of education. For feminised, the more senior example, undergraduate the level, the greater the study areas with large proportion of men, with gender gaps in salaries The gender gap only 25% of women three years out include in salaries among at a level above senior Architecture and Built lecturer. Environment, Health postgraduate coursework Services and Support, graduates persists across WGEA headcount Social Work, Nursing, figures reveal that all study areas... and Business and 51% of Level A staff are Management. women. However, this is likely to be under estimated, There are some exceptions as casual/sessional staff are where females are paid more usually appointed at Level A, and are than males such as in Creative Arts, not included in the Government’s FTE data at 4%. There are also some study areas with on levels. no, or very little gender gap in salaries such as Computing and Information Systems, The number of women Vice-Chancellors where salaries are equal; Engineering, at Australia’s 39 public universities has where males are paid 1% more than dropped by one since last year, to ten in females three years after graduation. 2020.
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VOLUME 28, SEPTEMBER 2020
Postgraduate gender pay gap The gender gap in salaries is more pronounced at postgraduate coursework level than for undergraduates. In 2017, four to six months after completion of their studies, the median salary of male postgraduate coursework graduates was $15,900 or 16.9% higher than females. In 2020, this gap has increased to $17,200 in dollar terms, which represents 15.8% of the full-time median female salary, three years after graduation. The gender gap in salaries among postgraduate coursework graduates persists across all study areas, in particular, in Medicine, Business and Management, Health Services & Support and Science and Mathematics, with gender pay gaps in excess of 15% three years after course completion. This is likely due to a range of factors such as occupation, age, experience, personal factors and possible inequalities within workplaces. continued on p.7...
