Should women really get the same salary as men?

Okay, now I have your attention, especially the ladies, everyone calm down and read this article. Apologies for the rage click bait, but let's see what you think about the read, and you are welcome to leave a comment?afterwards.

The Gender Pay Gap in IT: What's the Story ?

The gender pay gap in IT is a persistent issue, highlighting inequities faced by women in a sector that drives global innovation and economic growth. Despite technological advancements and increasing discussions about diversity, women in IT still earn less than their male counterparts, even when qualifications, roles, and performance are comparable.

The Reality of the Gender Pay Gap

Despite the revolutionary nature of the tech sector, progress on pay equity has been slow. In Europe, women in STEM-related professions earn 19% less than men in even those countries that have largely closed most of their overall gender gap. (World Economic Forum).

In 2022 across the pond in the U.S, women earned an average of 18% less than male colleagues in equivalent roles. (Pew Research)

In the United States, female IT workers consistently earn less than their male counterparts in the same position. (Our World in Data)

This chasm in income exists beyond base pay. Generally, women in IT receive smaller bonuses, fewer stock options, and limited access to promotions. The divergence in these arenas can have major differences in lifetime earnings, career satisfaction, and financial security. (Centre for Economic Policy Research), (BBC), (UK GOV).

Breaking Down Systemic Barriers and Common Justifications

The systemic nature of the gender pay gap precludes individual action from addressing it fully. It has to do with structural issues such as workplace policies, societal norms, and biases in evaluation. Rather than being framed as a result of individual choices, organizations and policy makers must centre efforts on eliminating the barriers that limit women's opportunities and foster inequities.

By addressing the "Expected" justifications with a fact-based understanding of "Actual" realities, the path toward true pay equity becomes clearer: organizations, governments, and individuals must work together to dismantle the systemic issues at the root of the gender pay gap.

Occupational Segregation

• Expected: Women avoid high-paying jobs like software engineering or leadership roles due to a preference for less demanding or more flexible careers.
• Actual: Cultural norms, workplace bias, and a lack of role models systematically deter women from pursuing these fields. Early stereotypes and limited STEM support reinforce this gap.
• Solutions: Provide mentorship, active recruitment, and eliminate hiring and promotion biases.

Career Interruptions

• Expected: Women take career breaks for caregiving, leading to less experience and slower advancement.
• Actual: Workplaces often penalize caregivers by failing to accommodate their needs. Policies like flexible hours, paid parental leave, and reintegration programs can mitigate these impacts.
• Solution: Allowing fathers and mothers equally to be able to take parental breaks. This is already a reality in Germany for example.

Part-Time Work

• Expected: Women choose part-time roles due to caregiving, resulting in lower pay and fewer opportunities for advancement.
• Actual: Part-time work highlights workplace shortcomings, not personal preference. Women juggle demanding caregiving alongside professional roles.
• Solutions: Equal pay for equal work, career training, and advancement opportunities for part-time employees.

Negotiation Practices

• Expected: Men are better negotiators, earning higher salaries and more promotions, while women struggle to advocate for themselves.
• Actual: Women who negotiate face backlash, unlike men, who are seen as assertive. This bias discourages women from negotiating at all.
• Solutions: Transparent pay scales and structured promotion standards to reduce reliance on negotiation.

Risk Tolerance and Job Preferences

• Expected: Men take on high-stress or hazardous roles, which justify higher compensation.
• Actual: Structural barriers, like exclusion from leadership pipelines and workplace discrimination, limit women’s opportunities. High-pressure roles are shaped by societal expectations, not inherent gender traits.
• Solutions: Address biases and ensure equal opportunities for demanding roles.

Historical Justifications and Modern Realities

• Expected: Women’s lower education levels, shorter careers, and employment in low-paying fields explain historic pay gaps.
• Actual: Women now graduate at equal or higher rates than men, with growing STEM representation. Biased hiring, lack of mentorship, and rigid policies still prevent equitable outcomes.
• Solutions: Address structural barriers to allow women to leverage their qualifications for career advancement.

Role of Leadership and Corporate Culture

Leadership and organizational culture are the linchpins of the pay gap issue. Even when individual points within organizations may urge on pay equity, systemic inertia often hampers progress.

For instance, one such analysis in 2023 found women sitting on FTSE 100 boards earned 69% less than their male peers, who made an average of ￡1,073,445 versus ￡335,953 among women. (BM Magazine).

This gap reflects the deep-rooted inequity of structures within decision-making and pay at the highest planes of leadership.

As a general observation, and not specifically fem-centric, company culture is part of the problem, too: workplaces that prize constant availability and intense negotiation unwittingly discriminate against employees who take a collaborative or flexible approach to getting the job done. In companies whose cultures are inclusive, however, the pay gap tends to be narrower, a sign that business leaders who want to change the status quo can do so.

Closing the Pay Gap: What Works, What's Next

Efforts toward improving the gender pay gap in IT have begun, but much more needs to be done. It is only through scaling and combining such initiatives with forward-thinking strategies that disparities will cease to exist.

Many companies are taking steps to improve pay equity. Firms like Salesforce and Intel regularly conduct pay audits and have instituted transparent salary structures to identify and root out disparities. Cisco and other tech leaders have initiated mentorship programs and diversity benchmarks, building workplace cultures that make a priority of inclusivity and accountability.

Government initiatives have been another factor. For example, in the UK, compulsory gender pay gap reporting has brought unequal pay into sharper focus, and companies have been pressured to reassess their policies. Educational pipeline interventions, such as Girls Who Code and Women in Tech, are making sure that more women join higher-paying tech fields.

While these efforts constitute a foundation for advances, they are insufficient to redress systemic inequities.

Closing the gender pay gap requires more than piecemeal efforts; it requires organizations to adopt systemic change. Companies should have strong policies on issues such as pay scale standardization, flexibility in working, and full parental leave. These moves would not only help women in the workforce but also create an environment where anyone has the chance to thrive.

Governments must take a firmer stance on enforcement. Transparency laws should be coupled with accountability mechanisms, such as penalties for non-compliance and incentives for companies that demonstrate measurable progress. Globally, legislation that promotes workplace equity needs to be harmonized to ensure consistent standards across regions.

At the individual level, mentorship and sponsorship are still essential. Helping women develop the confidence to negotiate and promoting them to new opportunities is life-changing. Growing the network of more allies, men and women, can also help break down the cultural and structural barriers that perpetuate inequities.

The solution to the gender pay gap requires collaboration. Companies, governments, and individuals need to work together in order to create a unified strategy that helps them get at the roots of inequity. The current initiatives undoubtedly provide a starting point, but their full potential can only be realized when combined with bold, forward-thinking strategies that reimagine workplace norms.

Conclusion: Where Do We Go From Here?

The gender pay gap in IT indicates deeper systemic barriers and cultural norms. Male colleagues are often supportive, but systemic inertia of companies restricts progress. HR departments, despite being influential, have very limited rules that are clear and enforceable to handle disparities in pay. Also, governments have to make more vigorous enforcement and offer incentives for meaningful change.

What do you think? How can companies make long-lasting policies regarding pay gaps? Do governments need to implement stricter regulations, or is the responsibility more corporate- leadership-oriented? Why do HR departments fail miserably in taking adequate measures with regard to this issue?

Let me begin to have a conversation with you about how we can move forward. Awareness is the first step, but real progress requires bold action. I hope we can create a future where equity is the standard, not the exception.

*While AI was used in generating this article, its content has been thoroughly reviewed, rewritten, and humanized by a living, breathing human to ensure accuracy, readability, and an overall flesh-and-blood style.