From today women work for ‘free’

Throughout Europe, women on average earn two months’ less salary than men. In Hungary, the situation is even worse. 

Women technically work for free or two months of the year, writes Szeretlekmagyarorszag.hu. From the 2nd of November, only men get paid for their work. The European Commission has illustrated the difference between men’s and women’s salary: in Hungary the hourly rates are even worse than the EU average, while the situation is slightly better concerning wages.

In Europe, women’s average hourly rate is 16.3% less than men’s. If thought of in terms of days, women don’t get paid for their work from the 2nd of November until the end of the year. The gap is even bigger when it comes to total wages, totaling 41.1%.

In the long run, this affects pensions. The average pension for women is 39% less than men’s due to the discrepancy.

In Hungary, the difference between women’s and men’s average hourly rate is 18.4%, while it is 32.7% in total wages.

The European Commission found several reasons for this, including:

• executive positions are usually filled by men and are promoted more often, making their salary higher
• women do much more work free of charge, such as raising children, housework, taking care of the family (men do this nine hours per week while women work free of charge for 26 hours a week, which is four hours/day in average)
• women leave the labour market temporarily more often than men, affecting their future career, salary and pension
• some professions (such as education and trade) have emasculated, thus lowering salaries
• salary-discrimination

Surveyed Europeans reportedly find the salary gap between men and women problematic, and want solutions. Despite laws addressing pay discrepancy between men and women, the problem persists. At current levels, it could take 70 years for the gap to disappear.

Translated by Alexandra Béni
Edited by MC

Source: http://www.szeretlekmagyarorszag.hu/