PwC study: 18-year-old women starting work today will not see pay equality in their careers

'Motherhood penalty'

The loss of lifetime earnings women are hit with when raising children has been coined 'the motherhood penalty' and has become the "most significant driver to the gender pay gap", according to PwC.

In its annual Women in Work Index study, PwC found that progress towards gender equality at work in the past decade has been "exceedingly slow", with a persistent gender pay gap of 14%, down only 2.5 percentage points since 2011. PwC noted that the slight year-on-year improvement was not as a result of positive, systematic changes; rather it was a symptom of the economic recovery from Covid-19 labour markets. It "does not demonstrate genuine progress towards gender equality", the report stated. FTSE 350 hits boardroom target of 40% women for first time Larice Stielow, senior eco...