Basia McDougall MPhil.pdf - OpenAIR @ RGU - Robert Gordon ...

Chapter 1Are we nearly there yet?1.1 Women in the workforce1. Women are still paid, on average, 22.6 per cent less per hour than men. The figure hasrisen slightly since 2007, when it was 21.9 per cent.2. The full-time gender pay gap, which was 12.5 per cent in 2007, is now 12.8 per cent.3. Pay gaps are greater for part-time workers (39.9 per cent), which is significant given that41% of women work part-time compared with just 12 % of men.4. Many women work below their skill levels.5. There are 22 companies in the FTSE 100 that have all-male boards.6. Gender discrimination due to maternity leave remains present in the employment sphere.Adapted from Day 2009.Figure 1: Women in the employment - an overviewQuantitative data offers an objective context for such findings. Lopez-Claro et al. (2006)placed the UK in 7 th position in a study of gender equality taking the following variables intoconsideration: economic opportunity; economic participation; health and well-being pluspolitical empowerment (i.e.: number of women in government). The top two countries wereSweden and Norway, America came 17 th and Switzerland 34 th , based on pre-recession data.The gender equality report reflects, in part, the existence of maternity legislation, which isthen reflected in organisational policies – an area covered in section 1.5. With respect towomen in the workplace, the latest data for Scotland states that as many women work asmen (MacPherson and Bond, 2009).In 1928, Emmeline Pankhurst led the campaign for the right to vote for women. Within livingmemory, women stopped work as soon as they married, or in later years, stopped when theybecame mothers. For example, female Civil Servants were obliged to stop work as soon asthey married, despite holding a range of posts during the First and Second World War. Therationale was that women in employment was a pis aller (Zimmeck, 1984). With reference tothe anti-married women policy during the interwar years in the 1920’s and 30’s:6