New research shows Australian employers that measure their gender pay gaps are making positive progress in closing them.

A study by Curtin University and the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) - Gender Equity Insights 2018: Inside Australia’s Gender Pay Gap - shows organisations that completed a pay gap audit and took action saw the pay packets of female top-tier managers boosted by $24,000 on average, while male top-tier manager salaries decreased by $4,000.

Its key findings include;

  • More Australian employers are taking action against gender pay gaps. Employers undertaking a pay gap analysis increased from 24.0 per cent to 37.7 per cent between 2014 and 2017
  • About half of reporting organisations that conducted a pay gap analysis took some action in light of the results
  • Only about 1 in 4 organisations that undertook a pay gap analysis reported these results to the Executive
  • Actions to correct gender pay gaps are three times more effective when combined with reporting to the Executive or Board. These organisations saw an average reduction of 3.3 percentage points in their organisation-wide gender pay gap in one year
  • Compared with organisations that took no action on pay equity, companies that report pay gaps to their Board and correct their like-for-like pay gaps have lower full-time managerial pay gaps: 9.7 percentage points lower for base salaries; 12.7 percentage points lower for total salaries
  • Organisations that completed a pay gap audit and took action saw female top-tier managers pay boosted by $24,000 on average, while male top-tier manager salaries decreased by $4,000
  • Almost two-thirds of organisations in the finance and insurance and mining sectors undertook a pay equity audit. This compares to around 20 per cent in the female-dominated health and education sectors