New legislation will require EU employers to disclose
information making it easier to compare salaries and expose gender
pay gaps.
The European Parliament on 30 March 2023 overwhelmingly approved
pay transparency rules that had been proposed by the European
Commission two years ago. After formal adoption by the Council of
Europe, member states will have three years to implement the rules
into their national law.
Gender pay gap obligations
The primary target of the new rules is the so-called gender pay
gap, which still stands at around 13% in Europe despite previous
efforts to tackle it. A number of EU countries have adopted their
own national rules on gender pay gap reporting, but the new
European rules go further than most existing laws in terms of what
reporting is required and what employers must do when a gender pay
gap is identified.
