In South Asia, Pakistan records the largest gender employment gap, alongside a substantial wage disparity, as reported by the International Labour Organization (ILO).
The International Labour Organisation (ILO) recently released the 'Pakistan Gender Pay Gap Report 2025', shedding light on the factors contributing to the large gender pay gap in Pakistan's labor market.
1. **Unexplained Wage Disparities**: Despite accounting for observable factors like age, education, occupation, and hours worked, a significant portion of the wage gap remains unexplained. This suggests that discrimination or other unmeasured factors may play a significant role.
2. **Low Female Labor Force Participation**: Women make up only 13.5% of the workforce, which compounds the wage gap issue. This low participation is a major barrier to their economic empowerment.
3. **Higher Education with Lower Earnings**: Women in wage employment are more likely to have higher levels of education than their male counterparts but still earn less. This disparity contradicts the expectation that education would narrow the pay gap.
4. **Comparative Jobs and Sectors**: Despite working in comparable roles and often having better qualifications, women earn less than men. This is seen across both formal and informal sectors, including the public and private sectors.
5. **Global Comparison**: The gender pay gap in Pakistan is significantly higher than in other lower-middle-income countries, indicating unique challenges in Pakistan's labor market that need to be addressed.
The report also highlights some positive trends. The gender pay gap is smaller among highly educated and younger individuals. Women in wage employment in Pakistan are more likely to work part-time, and female employees are more frequently found in the public sector, formal employment, and jobs with permanent contracts.
However, over the past decade, the employment gap between men and women in Pakistan has not significantly decreased. Potential reasons for the gender pay gap include occupational segregation, a lack of transparency in company pay structures, and discriminatory pay practices.
The gender pay gap is more noticeable in agriculture and manufacturing compared to the service sector. In a promising development, the KP government has launched the Gender Parity Report 2024, signaling a commitment to addressing these issues.
PSX, Pakistan's stock exchange, has also made a commitment to gender equality, although specific details about this commitment are not provided in the article.
Despite these challenges, the report underscores the importance of continued efforts to promote gender equality in Pakistan's labor market and empower women economically.
- Analysis of Education Level and Value: While women in wage employment in Pakistan often have higher levels of education than men, they continue to earn less, a disparity which questions the assumption that education would narrow the pay gap.
- Value of Sector Diversity: The gender pay gap is more noticeable in agricultural and manufacturing sectors, opposing the relatively smaller gap observed in the service sector, highlighting the importance of diversity in employment sectors.
- Science, Policy, and Politics: The Pakistan Gender Pay Gap Report 2025 presents extensive data about the gender pay gap in various sectors, prompting discussions on workplace-wellness, health-and-wellness, and women's health in the context of policy-and-legislation and politics.
- Gender Equality in the Workplace-Wellness Agenda: Recognizing the persistence of the gender pay gap, the KP government's release of the Gender Parity Report 2024 demonstrates a commitment to addressing this issue as part of a broader agenda for workplace-wellness and general news.
- Role of Corporate Initiatives: Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) has pledged its commitment to gender equality, adding corporate initiatives to the array of measures needed to improve the status of women in the workforce, presented in the report.
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