Is Australia a working woman's 'paradise'?

Advancement gap

On the basis of the 2006 WEF gender gap report Australia has an enviable record in the area of women’s employment opportunity. Relative to other countries in the WEF sample it would seem that the share of women in professional and technical occupations is particularly commendable, with the WEF giving Australia top rank against this indicator.

Sex-segregation is, however, deeply entrenched in Australia and likely to become even more entrenched if current patterns of employment see an increasing share of women move into the current limited set of part-time job opportunities.

In 2002 55.8 per cent of all employed women worked in highly feminised jobs (jobs where the share of women in employment was equal to 70 per cent or more). Research shows that although women have been making inroads to some areas of management such as sales and marketing management, policy and planning management and information technology management, other areas such as health professionals and educational professionals have, in recent years, seen increased feminisation.

Vertical segregation also remains endemic. In 2006 in the Higher Education sector, for example, women accounted for 54 per cent of the lowest promotional level, but only 23 per cent of those in the top two levels.

On-going sex segregation and current patterns of employment in Australia are contributing to acute skill shortages in particular areas, especially non-traditional areas such as resources sector and IT where attraction and retention is a particular problem. The masculine cultures in these sectors not only inhibit women’s progression they also affect other outcomes, such as wage equality.

Recent research shows that the major forms of discrimination in these sectors revolve around sexual harassment and the unavailability of quality, career level, part-time work to accommodate family responsibilities.

A suggestion

A more useful assessment of Australia’s advancement gap could be drawn from indicators measuring the “brain drain” from professional level jobs generated by rigid employment practices. If part-time employment is to continue as the main vehicle through which women in Australia balance their work and family responsibilities then it is critical that Australia offers a broader set of part-time employment opportunities to facilitate women’s career retention and advancement opportunities.

While the aims of the World Economic Forum (WEF) Gender Gap Report are laudable, and may be useful for policy making, the highly aggregated nature of the data together with the “authoritative voice” of the WEF is of concern. We need to consider the range of issues associated with the gender gap, particularly as related to women’s labour market participation, remuneration and advancement.

There are a number of areas where Australia is significantly behind other western countries. For example, Australia is one of two OECD countries without a paid maternity leave scheme (United States is the other). Women’s increased participation in Australia has been driven through growth in part-time, casual work. These developments will not deliver the sorts of economic and financial security that women in Australia require for true equality (on this indicator).

Through close analysis, it is apparent that Australia’s gender gap status is not only premature but fails to adequately address the complexities and intricacies of a globalised economy and its relationship to broader social and political discourses.

Within the Australian context women’s economic participation and opportunities cannot be divorced from wage determination, the provision of family-tax benefits, the tightening of welfare-to-work arrangements and the unresolved tensions relating to gender roles and family responsibilities. Women’s decisions about work are made within a milieu of competing discourses and interests. To ignore or underplay these complexities as seems apparent within the WEFs Gender Gap Report is inherently problematic.