Getting a job is often not easy, even though in most developed countries, unemployment rates are very low. However, the fact that the unemployment rate is low still implies that some people are looking for jobs but are yet to get employment. You might as a woman or as a man want to know which gender gets job more easily in the UK so that you can plan your strategy. You might even be a foreigner and want to go to a country where your gender will work for your favour when job hunting or at the very least not reduce your chances of getting a job. This article will discuss if it is harder for women to get a job in the UK than men.
Men or Women: Which gender gets a job easier in the UK?
From available data, women seemed to be slightly favoured when it comes to securing a job in the UK. As long as they have the relevant skills and qualification, the chances of a woman getting a job are believed to be about 16 per cent higher than a man who has similar skills and qualification. Even from statistics related to unemployment rates in the UK, the percentage of unemployed women is slightly lower than the percentage of unemployed men. For example, the unemployment rate in 2018 and 2019 in the UK was 4.0 per cent and 3.8 per cent respectively. Of this percentage, the male unemployment rate accounted for 4.1 per cent and 3.9 per cent while female unemployment rate accounted for 3.9 and 3.6 per cent respectively. Hence, it could be seen that compared to the population, women have a higher percentage of employment rate than the men. It is also worthy of note that of the total population of the United Kingdom that stands at about 66 million, 33.82 million are females while 32.98 million are males. The implication is that since there are more females than males, if the male and female employment rate were the same percentage, then more females will still be employed than male. However, because there are more females and a lower unemployment rate for females, more females are employed in the UK than males.
Pay gaps between genders in the UK
Apart from the ease of getting a job in the UK, you might also want to know if a particular gender is paid more than the other. In the UK, there is a gender pay gap of 15.5 per cent in 2020. In 2019, the figure was 17.4 per cent implying that there was a reduction in the gender pay gap in 2020. However, the pay gap mostly applies to those that are older. For individuals below 40 years, the gender pay gap is very close to zero. However, for older age groups, the gender pay gap was higher than 10 per cent.
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