Men continue to get a better pay in the Danish labor market according to new figures from Danmarks Statistik.
The average wage difference between men and women was 12.4 percent in 2023. This is 0.2 percentage points higher than in 2022.
The biggest difference is in the regions where women earned an average of DKK 46,313 per month, while men earned DKK 55,177 in 2023.
In 2004, men on the labor market received 16 percent more pay than women. Still, the path to equal pay is too long, believes Janne Bjaaland, director of people and culture at pension company Velliv.
“It’s good news that over a number of years women have approached men’s wages. But it is wrong and unsatisfactory that it is still necessary to talk about pay differences between the sexes and partly that in 20 years we have only cut a quarter of the difference,” says Bjaaland to Nordnet.
The pay gap continues into retirement, where women receive less in pension than men.
On average, men’s pension assets are 20 per cent. higher than women’s.
“Unfortunately, we also take the inequality that we continue to fight with in terms of pay into old age. It is yet another argument that we must have solved the structural injustice on equal pay,” says Janne Bjaaland.
She believes that inequality will change.
“Today, there are more younger women who are getting longer-term educations. It will contribute to raising women’s wages. More women will take up leadership positions, which have otherwise largely been a man’s business,” she says.
