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Gender pay gap? Twice as many men aim for higher wages

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The job website, Adzuna, has found that male job seekers are more ambitious when it comes to earnings, with men being twice as likely as their female counterparts to aspire to top jobs, paying over £100,000.

The findings follow in the wake of a separate survey by graduates that found young men still expect to earn more, work longer hours and be less satisfied in their job than female graduates.

Adzuna’s survey showed that nearly a third of women would be content with salaries between £20-30k, while only half that number of men claim they would be happy to receive the same level of pay. Although men dreamed of earning top salaries, male workers in Britain rate their salary as the least satisfactory element of their working lives. In fact one third (31%) of male employees rated their salary as top on their list of workplace annoyances.

It isn’t just financial aspects of careers that split the genders either, there are also difference between which industries that they aspire to work in. Women are more likely to pursue jobs in Media, PR & Advertising, Charity & Volunteer work and Teaching, whereas many of the male workforce hope to work in Digital / Technology & Engineering roles, according to the survey.

Male employees are also more confident about fulfilling their ambitions with 36% of men believing they will reach their goals or surpass them, compare to 16% of women. Men are more likely to blame internal factors for failing to reach career goals, saying laziness and lack of motivation is the main reason for ailing to reach your career goals.

Women, on the other hand, say lack of confidence could prevent them from reaching their goals along with external factors like family commitments and competition for jobs.

  • Nigel

    Back in the days of the Equal Opportunities Commission it funded a fairly large scale programme of research and academic papers. Overall the common conclusion was the key factor in the “pay gap” was time spent in the workforce. Time off work had a penalty. The result for the EOC was a policy shift from equal pay campaigns to encouraging shared childcare and funded childcare to shorten the periods women with  children were away from the workforce or working part time. The Fatherhood Institute starting off as one result. 
    Of course what the research found, and these days is clear in the statistics , is that people make rational choices based on their circumstances and aspirations. Very broadly young people aspire to settle and start” a family “, are comfortable with women nurturing and men earning ( but with more interest in varying this ) but do so in an environment of high living( well housing) costs. 
    Unsurprisingly men generally prioritise earning ( and this intensifies generally at the birth of their child/ren) with the realistic expectation that at some point they will have to spend at least a period as main earner for their family. Of course women generally make an equally rational plan prioritising flexibility as there may well be periods they will want time for their child/ren. The result is the northern European ” one and a half ” earner model of family earning . With no “pay gap” until women start loosening their ties to work at the time of having children. Of course many women  and not a few men vary these trends particularly if they are  ambitious or have only one child. 
    What is surprising to me is that this is so well understood and has been so for so long yet it is still somehow contentious or “contested”. I recall in the time of the labour gov. The ONS Chief Statistician twice  taking ministers to task about their misrepresentation of the “Pay Gap” through a publicly published letter. In other words the ONS was so sure of the solidity of it’s case it would risk a public confrontation with the Gov. 
    So this research is in a long tradition . Reflecting people’s aspirations and the rational choices made in pursuit of these aspirations.