In October 2021, a study conducted World Economic Forum: Gender pay gap to narrow by 2021to in just 276.6 years. Heavy data, which for a year and a half was motivated by the domino effect caused primarily by this pandemic. Which, as we know, put pressure on more than strategic sectors such as services, tourism and aid, on its first world tour, where women mostly work under precarious contracts and where on average 5% of them lost their jobs against 3.9% of the male population, but also the same property of a family unit, the care of which in the vast majority of cases fell on women. Italy is no exception, in fact in terms of economic opportunity at the time it was 114th out of 156 and in terms of the pay gap it was still 127th.

Today, the global scenario is even bleaker: a war is underway that, in addition to the ongoing tragedy in terms of broken human lives, millions of refugees and destruction, has added the collapse of the economy. And it hit the European Union especially hard: energy prices experienced a new surge, causing inflation to reach a record level. Ukraine and Russia produce almost a third of the world’s wheat and barley and are major exporters of metals. Supply chain disruptions and rising prices for many commodities have pushed up the prices of food and other basic goods and services. All this continues to plague companies and continues to have a tangible and tangible impact on our pockets. Brussels cut its economic growth forecast from 4% to 2.7% this year and from 2.8% to 2.3% next. Inflation, which was estimated at 3.9% just a few months ago, should now be around 6.8%.

It rains in wet weather, we could lazily say: in fact, in Italy, the salary situation has not been encouraging for some time. In April 2022, according to the Ministry of Labour, Italy was the fourth most “poor job” country in Europe. This translates into a plentiful supply of jobs that keep people below the poverty line. Furthermore, According to Istat, 2,277,000 women live in poverty in our country, which is more in absolute terms than minors, young people and the elderly.. Added to this is the pay gap. Financial consulting firm Blacktower analyzed 29 European countries, including Italy, to find out where women are more or less affected by this gap, linking this figure to the cost of living. Unfortunately, it turned out that our country ranks sixth.. Italy in numbers therefore it has a gender pay gap of about 4.2%, but at the same time has a fairly high cost of living, roughly the same and with necessary geographical differences, up to 755.38 euros per month..

Women earn, on average, 20% less than men, and it is much harder for them to grow professionally, and this is also confirmed by data from European Women on Boards, who conducted a survey similar to today’s one a few months ago. The data shows that female CEOs in Italy were only 3% in 2021 and 15% at the head of the board of directors, and the statistics have worsened due to the overall crisis caused by the pandemic. Women receive less support, are penalized for motherhood, and work management is inadequate for their needs. “With an unemployment rate of 8.1%, according to the latest Istat data, and 42.6% of mothers aged 25 to 54 who are not working, Italy shows that it still has a long way to go to achieve gender parity,” they say. Blacktower analysts.

The pandemic crisis has greatly increased gender differences to the detriment of women. “Compared to previous crises,” he commented Maria Cecilia GuerraDeputy Economy Minister in the face of early 2021 data – the impact of the pandemic has been particularly negative for women. Female employment at 49% in 2020 is the worst since 2013.”. The employment rate of women then declined further between young women (33.5%) and women who live in Southern Italy (32.5%). In addition, there has been a sharp increase in the number of women forced forced underemployment, that is, all those who are satisfied with a job, possibly precarious and much less paid, even if looking for a full-time job: from 60.8% in 2019, we have moved to 61.2% in 2020. In Europe, this figure is 21.6%, which is about three times lower. Finally, as explained in detail by Il Sole 24 July 2022″Italy is one of the countries where the pay gap between men and women is widening due to higher positions in the hierarchy. There are 9 income groups here: the first is represented by the lowest incomes, the ninth – by the highest incomes. In the eighth and ninth groups, women earn 63% and 69% less than men. And levels of education are the same between men and women up to the eighth decile of income, which means that few women with high levels of education occupy the top positions.”

Given that Italy has a poor record but is not a white fly in the EU, the European Parliament has plans to take action. gender pay gap which in the Union continues to fluctuate around 13-14% with significant variations between different countries. And he did so by adopting a negotiating mandate that would allow him to start negotiations with EU governments on a wage transparency directive. For the European Union, companies with at least 50 employees should be required to publish their employees’ payroll data in order to identify the pay gap and take action once and for all..