UK’s female managers face ‘midlife pay crisis’

The gender pay gap among managers in the UK is substantially worse higher up the ladder, according to a survey from the Chartered Management Institute.

It says the problem is biggest for professional women aged 40-plus, who on average earn 35 per cent less than their male counterparts. To earn the same amount over a career, women would have to work for nearly 14 years more, it estimates.

Ann Francke, chief executive of the CMI, said many women were being hit by a “midlife pay crisis”.

“We have to stamp out cultures that excuse this as the result of time out for motherhood and tackle gender bias in pay policies that put too much emphasis on time served.”

However, the CMI says the figures for the next generation of female managers “show some causes for optimism” with wages for women edging above their male counterparts at some junior levels.

Based on a survey of 68,000 professionals across the public and private sectors, the CMI estimates there is a 23 per cent gap between what full-time male and female managers earn, about 5 per cent worse than the latest official figures for managers, directors and senior officials.

Most striking is how the gap rises through the age groups. It stands at 6 per cent for those between 20 and 25 and 8 per cent for those aged between 26 and 35, before jumping to 35 per cent for the over 40s.

The CMI says it does not have comparable data from previous years to assess whether this gap is growing or shrinking. The survey does not have a breakdown by industry, so it is not clear whether the problem is worse in certain sectors.

According to official figures, the gap between men and women’s pay overall has shrunk substantially since the mid-1970s. In 1975 there was a marked difference across most age groups, peaking at the age of 38 where men were paid on average 61 per cent more than women. But by 2013, pay was similar for both sexes up to the age of about 30, with the divergence peaking at 45 per cent for those aged 49.

The disparity has steadily moved up the policy agenda, with the Confederation of British Industry, the UK’s largest business lobby group, urging the government to set a national target for reducing the pay gap.