A detailed survey of women’s incomes has been produced by the government.
Among its main conclusions are:
- the “gender penalty” for full-time married women was 8% in 1994, down from 16% in 1980;
- a graduate full-time woman is estimated to earn £1.2 million less than an equivalent man over her working life;
- a low-skilled mother of two loses 60% of the earnings from childbirth to retirement she would have earned had she not had children;
- a woman who first gives birth at 24 loses twice as much income as a woman who first gives birth at 30;
- qualifications make a huge difference to how employable are mothers with children under five. In 1998, 76% of women with at least an A-level were in employment, compared with 27% of women with no qualifications;
- from 1968 to 1990, women grew as a percentage of the workforce from 37% to 48%, while their proportion of all earnings grew from 20% to 31%.
Women’s Incomes over the Lifetime. 211 pages. HMSO £20
[2000]