It’s International Women’s Day. As feminists rush to detail the many disadvantages still facing women (yes, all women, everywhere) we’ll no doubt hear a great deal about the gender pay gap. In that regard, International Women’s Day is a bit like every other day of the year. But let’s go with it.
According to the Office for National Statistics, the gap between the median hourly earnings of men and women working full time is 9.1 per cent. The Fawcett Society prefers the mean figure of 14.1 per cent. Actually, they’d like us to focus on the gap between the total average earnings of men compared to women – about 18.4 per cent. Whatever. When we compare the pay of men and women doing the same jobs, at the same level, for the same number of hours the pay gap shrinks into insignificance.
But the pay gap is big news at the moment as businesses
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