It will take 257 more years to close the gender pay gap: Here's why

It's the year 2277, and women have finally achieved equal pay at work.

This sounds startling – but it may be the reality.

The World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2020 says men and women will have pay equality in 257 years, 55 more years than the estimate in the previous edition.

While the overall gender gap across politics, education, health and work has narrowed, the latest figures show the gender pay gap has widened – though it’s still better than it was in 2006 when the World Economic Forum began measuring the global gender gap.

Why is the world regressing on this important measure of gender equality?

Although the report finds a 2% increase in the number of women in senior roles, it says women’s participation in the labour market is stalling and financial disparities are growing, which explains the widening of the gender pay gap.

Currently, only 55% of adult women are in the labour market, compared to 78% of men. Meanwhile, more than 40% of the wage gap and 50% of the income gap still need to be closed.

Worldwide, the average woman’s annual income is $11,500, versus $21,500 for a man.

To make matters worse, in many countries a lack of access to capital, land or financial products prevent women from making a living.

There are many factors behind the disparity in earnings and career opportunities. They include women choosing lower-paid occupations, working part-time, the “motherhood penalty,” doing most of the childcare and household chores and, not least, discrimination and bias.

In the rapidly changing world of work, another major obstacle to closing the gender pay gap is the under-representation of women in the most in-demand occupations.

Based on a new analysis produced in collaboration with LinkedIn, the report looks at emerging gaps at what it calls “the frontiers of the new economy,” where employment and wage growth are rising rapidly.

Here, women outnumber men in just two of eight job clusters, "content production" and "people and culture."

Only 12% of professionals in "cloud computing" are women, 15% in 'engineering" and 26% in "data and artificial intelligence."

In order to tackle the gender pay gap, leaders will need to do more to equip women for the professions of the future, through continuous upskilling or reskilling, along with diversifying hiring and creating inclusive work cultures.

"Supporting gender parity is critical to ensuring strong, cohesive and resilient societies around the world. For business, too, diversity will be an essential element to demonstrate that stakeholder capitalism is the guiding principle.

"This is why the World Economic Forum is working with business and government stakeholders to accelerate efforts to close the gender pay gap," said Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum.