The gender pay gap still exists even though women do better at school and university than men. Women in the EU earn around 16 % less per hour than men and work 59 days per year for free, the latest EU report find. Also, the gender pay gap varies across Europe. It is below 10 % in Slovenia, Poland, Italy and Luxembourg, but wider than 20 % in the United Kingdom, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Greece, Germany, Austria and Estonia. Furthermore, the impact of the gender pay gap means that women earn less over their lifetimes. This results in lower pensions and a risk of poverty in old age.The report confirms the effective application of the equal pay principle is hindered by the lack of transparency in pay systems, the lack of clear benchmarks on pay equality, and by a lack of clear information for workers that suffer inequality. Increased wage transparency could improve the situation of individual victims of pay discrimination who would be able to compare themselves more easily to workers of the other sex.Read the report “Tackling the Gender Pay Gap in the European Union”