News: Blue collar workforce not spared gender pay gap

Diversity

Blue collar workforce not spared gender pay gap

Not only do blue collar workforce suffer from lack of pay parity but as workers get older, the pay difference appears to widen even more, and women's participation decreases, reveals research by SalaryBox.
Blue collar workforce not spared gender pay gap

The persistent income disparity between men and women exists across all industries, and while workers' wages have been steadily increasing in numerous sectors, the value allocated to women's workforce is still undervalued.

Females in the workplace made Rs 12,398 on average, which was 19% less than their male colleagues, reveals research by free staff attendance & payroll management app SalaryBox, bringing forth the country's wide gender pay disparity. This pay gap persists  despite the fact that salons, schools, supermarkets, and boutiques employ nearly the same number of females as males.

In addition to this, as the workforce gets older, the pay difference appears to widen even more, and women's participation in the labour decreases, says the research.

The research, conducted across 850 districts across India, highlights that over two-thirds of Indian blue-collared workforce employees earn less than Rs 15,000 per month and less than 15% of the employee base earns in the range of Rs 20,000-40,000 per month (or Rs 25,000 on an average), calling attention to the fact that a vast majority of Indians have difficulties securing even a livable wage.

Interestingly, the majority of firms pay wages below the minimum wage set by the Central Pay Commission (CPC), that is Rs 18,000 per month.

The SalaryBox research also found that only 27% of the workforce is made up of women, whereas 73% of the workforce is made up of men.

Employees working at supermarkets, grocery/kirana/general stores as well as the garments/textile industries are paid at the lower end of the scale, with an average monthly salary of Rs 8,300. Logistics and transport, IT software, and tailoring /boutiques emerge as the businesses that pay the most to females, with primary roles being of telecallers, documentation executives, and recruitment associates.

“For a long time, the topic of jobs — or rather, the lack thereof — has dominated India's economic discourse. While the headline employment/unemployment numbers get a lot of attention, another set of numbers that is equally significant — who gets paid how much — doesn't get nearly as much attention. It is high time that the companies bring in interventions that highlight this huge gap,” said Nikhil Goel, CEO and co-founder of SalaryBox.

“Economic development is still not translating into enough jobs for the yearly influx of educated young people entering the workforce. A much bigger proportion of Indians work in the informal sector, and they have been hit hard in recent months by increasing inflation, particularly in food prices,” he added.

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Topics: Diversity, #GigEconomy

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