On the occasion of International Women’s Day, celebrated each year on 8 March, Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union, publishes an article on gender pay gap statistics. This News Release only shows a small part of the large amount of gender based data available at Eurostat.

Lowest gender pay gap in Romania and Italy, largest in Estonia The gender pay gap in the EU Member States, in 2016, was less than 10% in Romania (5.2%), Italy (5.3%), Luxembourg (5.5%), Belgium (6.1%), Poland (7.2%), Slovenia (7.8%) and Croatia (8.7%, data for 2014). Conversely, the gender pay gap was over 20% in Estonia (25.3%), the Czech Republic (21.8%), Germany (21.5%), the United Kingdom (21.0%) and Austria (20.1%).

Compared with 2011, the gender pay gap has dropped in most of the EU Member States. The most noticeable decreases between 2011 and 2016 were recorded in Romania (-4.4 percentage points – pp), Hungary (-4.0 pp) Spain and Austria (both -3.4 pp), Belgium (-3.3 pp) and the Netherlands (-3.0 pp). In contrast, the gender pay gap has risen between 2011 and 2016 in ten Member States, with the most significant increases being observed in Portugal (+4.6 pp) and Slovenia (+4.5 pp). At EU level, the gender pay gap has decreased slightly, by 0.6 pp, from 16.8% in 2011 to 16.2% in 2016.