Gender pay gap – where is there progress, where is there stagnation?

March 8 is International Women's Day – a new study by the Hans Böckler Foundation takes a look at the current state of gender equality in the run-up to the event: Where has progress been made, and where has there been stagnation?

The key trends: Although the gender pay gap is slowly shrinking and the pension gap has also narrowed, However, there is still a huge gap between women and men, especially in terms of labor force participation. These differences are particularly noticeable when children are living in the household. In households with children, the proportion of couples with a male sole earner is still twice as high as among childless couples.

Fundamentally, the total working time between the sexes is also very unevenly distributed: while mothers perform up to 60% unpaid housework and care work during their approximate working week, 60% of men's working week consists of paid employment.

And even though the gender pay gap in 2024 was “only” 16% (in 2014, it was still 22.3% according to the WSI), it remains well above the EU average of 12%. The DGB has more details and specific measures for reducing this gap.

We were also interested in the following topics:

• Gen Z in the labor market: A new study sheds light on the situation of young people in the labor market and shows that they are participating more actively than they have in decades. Students in particular are increasingly working part-time and entering the labor market at an early age.

• Trade or study: In view of rising unemployment among academics in Germany, many are questioning the value of a university degree – but what is the safer choice and who comes out on top in terms of salary? Tagesschau knows the answer.

• Immigration: For a long time, the German labor market was a huge pull factor for skilled workers migrating to Germany. But new figures show that despite high immigration numbers, a significant proportion of immigrants leave Germany within the first four years of arrival.

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