The pay gap is the widest for professions in Finance and Healthcare, but it also persists across other sectors.New analysis by Michael Page, the specialist recruitment company, reveals that male financial managers are earning almost £45,000 a year more than women working in the same occupation. Similarly, the annual salary of female health professionals is less than half the salary of their male colleagues.
The analysis, which looked at median and 80th percentile salaries of people employed in a variety of occupations, published in the 2014 Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, revealed professions with the widest gender pay gaps for the top 20% of earners:
- Financial managers and directors. The top 20% of male earners make over £112,657 a year, but their female counterparts earn on average almost £45,000 (40%) less.
- Health professionals. Men in the top 20% of earners make more than £75,841 a year, whereas women in the same salary bracket earn upwards of £37,265 – 51% less than men.
- Medical practitioners. Top female earners make £83,697 a year and men in the same occupation earn upwards of £121,470 annually – 31% more than women.
The pay gap is the widest for professions in Finance and Healthcare, but it also persists across other sectors, as male top earners in corporate management, sales, and education make more than women in the same salary tier working in the same occupations.
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One explanation for the persistence of the gender pay gap may lie in the hiring trends. Analysis of Michael Page’s internal data suggests that whereas share of female hires often exceeds that of male hires across different sectors, men still outnumber women in hires for roles that pay £60,000 or more.
Analysis of national statistics reveals that the share of women employed in an occupation doesn’t necessarily make a difference to the pay gap. Even in professions where women represent 70% or more of the workforce, men earn more than women:
- 87% of nurses are female, but the gender pay gap still stands at 14% as on average top-earning men make more than £40,222 a year whereas women make upwards of £34,730.
- Women account for 81% of all teachers in primary schools and nurseries, with top female earners making £37,657 a year, which is 15% less than men who earn £44,299.
An interactive visualisation of this analysis can be found in ‘The Pay Gap at the Top’ which plots gender pay gap across 89 occupations throughout the UK.
