Significant Gender pay gap in India at 27 percent: Monster Salary Index

Monster India released the latest ‘Monster Salary Index’ (MSI). The highlights of MSI indicate that the gender pay gap in India stands at 27 percent where men earned a median gross hourly salary of Rs. 288.68, whereas women earned only a median gross salary of Rs. 207.85 per hour. The report covers eight different sectors - IT Services; Health care, caring services, social work; Education, research; Financial services, banking, insurance; Transport, logistics, communication; Construction and technical consultancy; Manufacturing and Legal and market consultancy, business activities.

MSI is aimed at empowering jobseekers by establishing a benchmark to compare their salaries with other anonymous profiles across a broad spectrum of industry domains, experience, functional groups both in India and other global markets. For employers, MSI has an online salary survey that aims to provide employers with practical information and helps them make informed decisions by analyzing the salary market and optimizing employee remuneration.

Analysing the trends of the Indian job market, the highest gender pay gap was recorded in the Manufacturing sector at 34.9 percent. The lowest gender pay gap was recorded in the BFSI and Transport, logistics, communication, equally standing at 17.7 percent. Some of the reasons behind this gender pay gap could be the preference for male employees over female employees, preference for promotion of male employees to supervisory positions, career breaks of women due to parenthood duties and other socio-cultural factors.

Sharing his views, on the findings Sanjay Modi, Managing Director (India/Middle East/ Southeast Asia/Hong Kong) said, “Worldwide, the lack of pay parity has taken a centre stage with strong views being shared by sports persons, political and business leaders alike. Men often receive higher salary offers than women vying for the same title in the same organization. Needless to say, the situation is far from desired in India, especially when the country is gearing towards inclusive development. While some critics may claim that this gender pay gap is simply due to the choices women make - occupation, family, or education level, but that could not be further from the truth. Today we recognize Equal Pay Day, a day that symbolically represents when a woman’s salary finally catches up to what a man was paid in the previous year. But the task at hand is the pace at which this pay gap can be bridged. There is a strong need to create equal opportunities for all, particularly women, who are key contributors in the Indian job market.”

Modi further added, “The salary drawn by employees across sectors has revealed some thought provoking data. For instance, the drop of six percent in the median salary drawn by employees in the transport, Logistics and Communication sectors could be owing to the delay in growth of the sector. The sector could significantly benefit from the implementation of GST proposal and the awaited spur from the growth of the ecommerce industry. Furthermore, it is ironic that while education is considered as one of the major factors in influencing salaries, yet it is least paid sector in India. If the government needs to fulfil its vision of ‘jobs for all’ and a skilled India, then we need a sound education ecosystem with high quality teaching staff. Hence, it has become imperative to make the salaries of teachers and researchers competitive, if not lucrative. In terms of the salary status in manufacturing, despite the government’s focus on the sector through its ‘Make in India’ initiative, the findings suggest that in addition to the highest gender pay gap, the salaries are still very low.”

Commenting on the report, Paulien Osse, Director WageIndicator Foundation said, “MSI is a comprehensive research report aimed at empowering recruiters and jobseekers with a credible platform to compare salaries. This systematic research based report helps understand and provide a view across a broad spectrum of industry domains, experience, functional groups in India. The collaboration with Monster.com has helped us with the most trusted partnership in India to come up with this report.”

Talking about the report, Prof. Biju Varkkey of IIM-Ahmedabad said, “The report analysis every facet of compensation in various sectors paving path to the stable job market in the country. It is a repository of credible data that helps understand the salary trends in the Indian job market.”

The MSI report further indicates that while only 52.7 percent of employees are satisfied with their pay; a significant 75 percent are satisfied with their job. This clearly highlights how job satisfaction is not necessarily associated with satisfaction of salary.