Equal Opportunities Commission
Conference on Equal Pay for Work of Equal Value
18 March 2000

LEE Cheuk-yan
General Secretary HKCTU

Characteristics of Hong Kong’s Women Workers

A.	Labour Force Participation Rate
	Male:	75.2%		Female:	48.8%

B.	Marital Status and Female Labour Force Participation Rate

Age Group	Labour Force Participation Rate
	
	Were Married
	Never Married	
20 - 29	66.8%	86.2%	
30 - 39	59.4%	95.4%	
40 and above	31.4%	74.0%	
	It is obvious that women’s career path is often interrupted by marriage.

C.	Employed Persons by Gender and Occupation
Occupation	Male	Female	
Managers and administrators	3.9	1	
Professionals	2.1	1	
Associate professional	1.6	1	
Clerks	1	2.5	
Service workers and shop sales workers	1.4	1	
Craft and related workers	30	1	
Plant and machine operators and assemblers	5.7	1	
Elementary occupations	1	1.2	
Men significantly outnumber women in managerial and professional jobs, while women are concentrated in clerical and low-skilled jobs.
D.	Employed Persons by Gender and Hours of Work
Hours of Work	Male	Female	
35 and below	132,400	127,600	
35 - 44	616,200	556,100	
45 - 49	539,000	258,500	
50 - 59	318,800	156,200	
60 and above	363,200	241,600	
Men generally work longer hours than women.  It is believed that for women with family responsibilities, their career development may be hampered by having to juggle their time between career and family.    The variations in working hours may also be due to the fact that there is no law in Hong Kong that imposes restrictions on working hours.

E.	Wage Gaps between Women and Men (Table 1)
	Crafts and Operatives
Occupational Group	Male	Female	%	
Crafts	568	388	68	
Operatives	400	266	67	
	All Industries
Occupational Group	Male	Female	%	
Supervisory and technical workers	16,386	15,403	94	
Clerical and secretarial workers	11,088	11,400	102	
Service workers	10,173	7,481	74	
Other miscellaneous non-production workers	8,645	6,405	74	
All occupations	12,181	10,993	90	
i.	The wage gaps between women and men in the occupational groups of craft workers and operatives are very wide, the differences being 68% and 67% respectively.
ii.	The wage gap for service workers and non-production workers is also significantly wide.
iii.	Other occupational groups that reflect substantial difference in earnings between women and men include service workers in Chinese and non-Chinese restaurants, and non-production workers in transport services.
iv.	In the hairdressing sector, women’s earnings are slightly higher than that of men.

Why does a wage gap exist in Hong Kong?
a.	Because of the traditional view that “men are breadwinners and women are home carers”, women’s earnings are not considered the main source of household incomes but a supplement to the men’s earnings, or as pocket money.   This view presumes that women’s earnings can be held down and do not need to be equal to their male counterparts, and women are forced to accept this view.
b.	Women’s labour force participation may be affected by marriage and child-rearing, and when pay levels are determined by length of service, women’s earnings are lower than men’s because of their career breaks. 
c.	Women enjoy fewer promotional opportunities due to family responsibilities, which may affect their ability to exert their maximum performance at work.  Even if they did their best, employers are likely to consider the effects of family responsibilities on female employees and will still prefer to promote male employees.
d.	The wage gap between women and men is also attributed to occupational segregation on the basis of gender.  Women’s economic activities remain highly concentrated in low-wage, low-productivity elementary occupations, with men dominating the highest-paying occupations such as managers and administrators.
e.	There is generally a lack of public education on “equal pay for work of equal value”.   Paragraph 12.8 of the Code of Practice on Employment under the Sex Discrimination Ordinance recommends that employers progressively implement equal pay for work of equal value.  Recommending progressive implementation is equivalent to saying that there is no need to take actions.  Since the legislation came into force, there has been limited public education on implementing equal pay for work of equal value.

The Way Forward
a.	Amend the Code of Practice on Employment under the Sex Discrimination Ordinance to require employers to implement the principle of “equal pay for work of equal value”.
b.	The Equal Opportunities Commission to publicise the principle of “equal pay for work of equal value”, encourage female employees to lodge complaints and hire “job evaluation” experts to estimate and compare gender work profile based on “technique, decision-making power and efforts being made”.
c.	To carry out “job evaluation” in occupations showing serious difference in salary payment for opposite sexes and promote the concept of “equal pay for work of equal value” in those occupations.

d.	To enact legislation on “equal pay for work of equal value” to fully implement the provisions relating to “equal pay for work of equal value” in the Sex Discrimination Ordinance (or Code of Practice on Employment under the Sex Discrimination Ordinance) and to institutionalize relevant procedures for filing complaints.

Economic Implications
The implementation of “equal pay for work of equal value” is not to mechanically close the wage gap between women and men but to eliminate the unreasonable differences in pay resulting from sex discrimination.  Legislation will not resolve the wage differentials caused by other factors such as seniority and occupational segregation.  To deal with those factors would require changes in attitudes in our society.