Yahoo Finance Gender gap widens in Aussie workforce
Australia is struggling to break gender barriers in the workplace.
Australia must take action to address worsening gender segregation in critical industries, the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) has found.
CEDA found occupational gender segregation – where a job is done by either mostly male or female workers – remains at a high level in Australia, despite the growing proportion of women in the workforce.
“There is still a low proportion of women in traditionally male-dominated industries such as: construction; mining; science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM); and manufacturing,” CEDA CEO Melinda Cilento said.
“Conversely, there is a low share of men in female-dominated industries, such as health care and education, and some of these occupations have become even more segregated over time. This limits job mobility, stifles labour-market flexibility and keeps a lid on productivity.”
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Workplace Gender Equality Agency figures show that, in 2018, just 12 per cent of construction workers were women, down from 14 per cent in 1998. Meanwhile, the proportion of female workers in health care and social assistance rose to 79 per cent in 2018, up from 77 per cent in 1998.
And even in female-dominated industries, men still disproportionately hold more leadership positions.
“While many social, historical and economic factors have driven this segregation, many of the remaining barriers to change are cultural – whether at the government, workplace or individual level,” Cilento said.
“We must tackle these entrenched cultural barriers wherever they exist.”
CEDA said one significant cultural barrier was access to flexible work, finding that rigid workplace structures and cultures - which insisted on fixed hours, locations and modes of attendance - further entrenched occupational segregation.
Since the pandemic, flexible work arrangements have become the highest priority for Australian jobseekers, overtaking salary.
Paid parental leave inadequate
CEDA said Australia had one of the least generous and most unequal paid parental leave schemes in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, with 99.5 per cent of parental leave taken by mothers.
The federal government expanded the scheme from 18 to 26 weeks in the October 2022 Budget, starting in July this year. The expansion also introduced greater flexibility around the timing of leave taken by both parents.
CEDA said it would be critical to reserve a greater share of leave for secondary carers (mostly fathers) and ensure it was paid generously enough to encourage greater take-up.
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