Today we are calling on all New Zealand organisations to measure, understand and take action on closing their gender pay gaps.
This year’s gender pay gap statistics show that from today, Monday 2nd December, the average working woman in Aotearoa New Zealand is effectively working for free. While Aotearoa New Zealand’s gender pay gap has decreased by 0.4 percentage points, moving from 8.6% in 2023, to 8.2% this year, this has only decreased the pay gap by one working day.
The overall average of 8.2% itself fails to represent the inequity that exists across different sectors and occupational groups, with the pay gap in some industries far more pronounced than others. At an industry level, the average gender pay gap in Financial and Insurance services sits at 29.3%. In Information, Media and Telecommunications it is 23.2%, and for Professional and Administrative services it sits at 19.9%.
This inequality is even worse for women of colour, with the average pay gaps of wāhine Māori and Pasifika women when compared to all men having increased since 2023. The average pay gap for wāhine Māori is sitting at 15% (an increase of0.7 percentage points), while Pasifika women have seen a significant increase of 1.8 percentage points to a 17% pay gap. This means that the average Māori woman has been working for free since Thursday November 6th, and the average Pasifika woman from Thursday October 30th.
This #NoPayDay, we are encouraging all New Zealanders to commit to calculating and closing the gap.
Last month, Manatū Wāhine Ministry for Women launched the first-ever Aotearoa New Zealand-based gender pay gap toolkit, making it easy for businesses to calculate, and then address, their pay gaps. We wholeheartedly support this first step from the government, and encourage businesses, government and individuals to unite in closing the gap. We all need to take accountability and reflect on how we can create a workforce that is equal for all, and the gender pay gap toolkit is an important part of this conversation.
We want all New Zealanders to be empowered to start the conversation around pay equity and transparency. Every individual can contribute to the conversation, be it through encouraging leadership teams to engage with the toolkit or having transparent conversations with people teams on future plans for DE&I.
If we all commit to shifting the dial, we can achieve a 0% gender pay gap for Aotearoa New Zealand’s workforce.
#NoPayDay