Women are still earning substantially less than men in Ireland despite efforts to promote equality in the workplace.
According to a study by the European Commission, women here earn on average 17.1 per cent less than men.
The study also indicated that only 123,000 women in Ireland earn more than €50,000 per year in comparison to 254,000 men.
The report, published today to coincide with European Equal Pay Day, noted the gender pay gap existed even though women did better at school and university than men.
It found women across the European Union earned on average 17 per cent less per hour than their male counterparts.
However, the pay gap varied significantly between countries from below 10 per cent in Belgium, Italy, Slovenia, Poland to above 20 per cent in Britain, Greece, Germany, Austria and Finland.
The study also suggested that younger women suffered less pay discrimination than their older colleagues.
The report found that Irish women in their 20s earned about 90 per cent of what their male equivalents did.
However, women in the 35-44 age group only earned 71.5 per cent of what male colleagues earned, and this falls even further for women in their 50s and 60s who earned only 61.4 per cent of men in the same age group earned.
The report said there were a number of reasons for the gender pay gap, including the discrimination against women, undervaluing of women’s work and skills and the low number of women in senior and leadership positions.
It also noted the fact that women continued to have the primary responsibility for care in our society which undermined their ability to earn as much as men.
Chief executive of the National Women’s Council of Ireland Orla O’Connor said: “In order to achieve equality for women in Ireland, the gap between women’s and men’s earning needs to be reduced, this means putting place family friendly policies, subsidised childcare provision to address the imbalance of care responsibilities in Ireland and ensuring that women are fully represented in senior positions in all areas of society.
“As the Government persists with its austerity measures it is vital that actions to improve the position of women in our society are not side-lined,” she said.
