Top (L-R): Emily Maitlis, Victoria Derbyshire, Sue Barker. Bottom: (L-R) Clare Balding, Fiona Bruce, Alex Jones.
You may (or may not) have been keeping a watchful eye on the BBC after the organisation published the salaries of its top talent. What we saw revealed a shocking gender pay gap. The figures exposed a huge disparity between the wages of women and men within the organisation. Only a third of the highest earners were female, the rest were male.
The announcement on the 19th July 2017 comes at a time when pay equality makes the headlines on a regular occasion. We have recently seen headlines telling us that Financial Times journalists are threatening to strike over the 13% pay gap at the organisation. Tech giant Google is currently facing the threat of being sued for sexism from over 60 of its past and present female employees. In older news we see thousands of women across Iceland leave work early in protest against the gender pay gap, maintaining a tradition held since 1975.
Gender Pay Gap News Timeline
10th August 2017: ‘Google is facing a lawsuit from employees over the gender pay gap’
10th August 2017: ‘Gender pay gap widening at one in four government bodies, figures show’
31st July 2017: ‘FT journalists threaten to strike over gender pay gap’
19th July 2017: ‘BBC accused of discrimination as salaries reveal gender pay gap Рas it happened’
19th July 2017: ‘BBC salaries: Gender pay chasm revealed with top male Chris Evans getting four times as much as top female Claudia Winkleman’
8th March 2017: ‚ÄòInternational Women’s Day 2017: Iceland becomes first country in the world to make firms prove equal pay‚Äô
25th October 2016: ‚ÄòIceland’s women leave work at 2.38pm to protest gender pay gap‚Äô
It is sad that women are still required to fight for the right to be paid the same as their male counterparts. What kind of message does it send to girls, when women work just as hard ‚Äì or often harder ‚Äì to be paid significantly less? This lower pay isn’t just due to issues such as maternity leave, but is directly reflected in hourly, monthly, or annual compensation. With women generally paid roughly 1/3 less than men, girls are told that their contributions will not be considered as valuable, even if their work is equal to or better than their male colleagues. It begs the question, why even try?
There are so many incredible women all over the world – both past and present – who are doing some amazing things and changing our world in some way. Why, then, do organisations continue to insist on paying them less than their male counterparts?
-Claire Amundson
Junior Girl
Girl Museum Inc.