Barriers of gender pay gap, low wages stand in way of women’s workforce participation

AMMAN — The gender pay gap, low wages and low participation of women in the labour market, are all factors affecting the economic situation and unemployment rate in Jordan, experts said.   

Citing a report titled “The Impact of Coronavirus Pandemic on Decent Work Standards in Jordan” prepared by the Phenix Centre for Economics and Informatics Studies, Ahmad Awad, the director of centre, noted that although Jordan was the first Arab country to sign an agreement with the International Labour Organisation to implement a national decent-work programme, work conditions in the Kingdom were in dire need for improvement even before the pandemic. 

According to the Department of Statistics, the gap in 2018 was about JD53 per month, he noted. 

“The reason why women are more likely to leave the labour market is because they have more unorganised jobs than men, especially in agriculture sector, in secretarial sector and in health-support sector. Another reason is that women in both private and public sectors don’t usually get promoted in their jobs, leaving men to get higher salaries,” Awad said. 

The gender wage gap for women and men working similar jobs with similar education and experience is about 17 per cent in Jordan’s private sector and 18 per cent and 22 per cent for all workers in Iraq and Lebanon, respectively. This combination of high unemployment and lower pay likely discourages some women from seeking work at all, according to a World Bank report. 

Many women have left their jobs due to the pandemic, which have increased unemployment, Awad added.

“Approximately $10 million are spent on women’s education every year, the majority of whom are not engaged in the labour market. The unemployment rate for educated Jordanian women is approximately around 77 per cent,” Awad said.  

“Increasing all forms of laws and legislation, providing a good working conditions and raising the wage levels in general, will increase the participation of women and men in the labour market,” he added. 

In a recent report titled “State of the Mashreq Women”, the World Bank said labour force participation in the Mashreq is exceptionally low, a problem likely to be exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The World Bank report calls for action in the following areas: Stronger economic growth, effective policy action to close legal gaps, promotion of more egalitarian attitudes, access to quality childcare, and the provision of safe transportation. 

The report also notes significant opportunities in the digital economy, however, without action to close the digital gender gap, those opportunities could become another barrier. 

Women’s participation in the labour market in the Mashreq countries (eastern Arab countrie) of Iraq, Jordan, and Lebanon remains among the lowest in the world. 

Less than 15 per cent of women work in Iraq and Jordan, and only 26 per cent do in Lebanon. The participation rates for women in these three countries lie between 25 and 35 percentage points below the international average, according to the report.

Participation is lower for less educated women with those women with university degrees comprising two-thirds of working women in Iraq and Lebanon. 

In Jordan the situation is more balanced with university educated women comprising half of all working women in the economy, the report said. 

As younger women increasingly have more education, labour force participation rates among the young are significantly higher in Lebanon and, to a lesser extent, Jordan, according to the report. 

In some other countries, a pattern of sharply increasing participation among younger age groups marked the beginning of a generational shift in which younger women participate to a greater degree in the labour market and older cohorts slowly leave the working-age population, according to the report.  

The governments of Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon have set ambitious targets for increasing female labour participation, which, if achieved and sustained over the longer term, will have substantial potential impacts on economic growth.

From 2000 to 2017, the annual economic growth rate in Iraq was 1.4 per cent; increases in the value added by female workers contributed 0.3 percentage points of this. In Jordan, females contributed 0.5 points of the 1.5 per cent annual growth rate; in Lebanon, they contributed only 0.2 points of the 1.5 per cent growth rate, the report said.  

Iraq and Lebanon have set a target of 5 per cent increase in the rate of participation of women in the labour force by 2025 while Jordan pledged to increase it to 24 per cent in the same time frame

If these increases in participation are continued for a decade further, annual economic growth would be increased by 1.6 percentage points in Iraq, 2.5 points in Jordan, and 1.1 points in Lebanon by 2035, according to the report. 

The report summarises the barriers to women’s economic participation and outlines a forward-looking agenda for policy makers and researchers. 

“There are structural barriers that still remain in the scope of work. The lack of child care support for working mothers, The lack of transportation, unequal payment and low wages,” Rand Naffa, a member of the advocacy organisation, SADAQA, told The Jordan Times.  

“The minimum wage isn’t even enough to fulfil the needs for anyone’s family,” Nariman Al Shawahen, a social activist, told The Jordan Times. 

“The fear of losing a job leads to accepting any agreement even when it violates the worker rights. There is a need for effective law enforcement mechanisms, including following up with filed complaints,” she added. 

Maryam, a single mother of two said that she has been struggling to find a job because she didn’t have a university degree. 

“I believe that women deserve to be in high places and get paid more, they are hard workers and they never leave until the job is done,” she added.  

 “The minimum wage needs to be raised so I can provide my children a decent life,” she noted.

Economist Wajdi Makhamreh said that the minimum wage in Jordan is JD220 and a study was initiated to rise it up to JD260 in the beginning of 2021.

“This might have a negative impact for some companies due to the economic problems that we are currently facing,” he told The Jordan Times.  

A lot of working women are not registered in social security, which makes it easier for business owners to pay them less than the minimum wage “without anyone knowing”. 

In order to prevent that, every women must be registered with the social security, Makhamreh said.  

 “There must be an organisation to support every working women, give training courses to grow their potential and stand up for their rights, especially those of them who live in rural areas,” he added.