Response to interpellation 2022/23:233 on equal pay
Translated from Swedish by AI; the translation may contain errors. The Swedish text is the original.
Summary AI, written in advance
L (1) notes that the wage gaps have decreased and that the government prioritizes economic equality through wage mapping 1. L (6) argues that life income is an important perspective and that wage setting is governed by the parties. L (11) considers that the development has proceeded too slowly and that the government should do everything in its power to accelerate it. L (13) denies that there are proposals to abolish reserved months. S (2) argues that the struggle is moving slowly and that a more equal withdrawal from the parental insurance is needed. S (3) argues that workers in female-dominated professions have worse conditions 2. S (5) argues that the government lacks concrete measures 3. S (7) argues that women get worse careers and lower pensions due to current withdrawals 4. S (8) wants municipalities to receive more money so that working women can work full-time 5. S (10) emphasizes that sexual harassment affects women's wages 6. S (12) looks forward to discussing the proposal to increase the number of double days 7.
Written by AI in advance and may contain errors. The numbers lead to the speech a statement builds on; check against the text below.
Speakers (13)
Statsrådet Paulina Brandberg (L)
Mr. Speaker! Sanne Lennström has asked me what concrete measures I will take to reverse the development and work towards equal pay.
Let me begin by stating that it is true that the wage gap between women and men increased in 2021. At the current moment, we do not yet know whether the marginal increase in wage differences in 2021, which moreover occurred during the Social Democrats' time in government, has continued or was a temporary bump in the downward curve during the 2000s. It could, for example, be about temporary changes in the labor market and postponed wage revisions as a result of the corona pandemic.
The wage differences between women and men have trend-wise decreased over two decades. This is partly due to a reduced gender segregation in the labor market and that women have increasingly become managers. It is also due to the fact that women's wages on average have increased more than men's wages. During the last seven years, relative wages have generally seen a greater increase in welfare occupations, such as within the healthcare and education sectors, than they have within typical occupations in the manufacturing industry.
According to the Medling Institute, the main explanation for the wage difference between women and men is that they work in different occupations and sectors. SCB's statistics show that only four of the 30 most common occupations have an even gender distribution. This gender distribution in the labor market can primarily be explained by the fact that women and men largely choose different educations. To counteract gender segregation in the labor market, the Gender Equality Authority has been tasked with compiling existing research and knowledge on gender differences in educational choices. The authority's report shows that gender-bound educational choices and the gender segregation they entail are problematic on several levels in society. Individuals' opportunities to explore and develop different interests and skills are limited. Also from a societal perspective, it is a problem when the recruitment base in the labor market is limited.
Women have lower wage incomes than men. In addition to the fact that men generally have higher wages than women, the total wage incomes are also affected by the fact that it is significantly more common for women to work part-time and be on parental leave, as well as that they take greater responsibility for home and care work.
Let me clarify that the issue of economic equality is prioritized by the government. A tool to make unjustified pay differences visible is the work with pay mapping. The Discrimination Act contains provisions, including requirements for all employers to conduct an annual pay mapping for the purpose of detecting, addressing, and preventing unjustified differences in pay between women and men. The Equality Ombudsman supervises that the Discrimination Act is followed.
An ongoing government assignment in this area is that the Gender Equality Authority has been tasked to conduct an analysis of the gender-segregated labor market and develop proposals to counter gender-bound study and career choices. In the assignment, the Gender Equality Authority shall obtain knowledge and experiences from Arbetsförmedlingen, the Swedish Council for Higher Vocational Education, the Swedish National Agency for Education, the National Board of Health and Welfare, the Swedish Higher Education Authority, as well as Sveriges Kommuner och Regioner. The assignment shall be reported by April 28 at the latest.
Furthermore, Medlingsinstitutet has been tasked with conducting gender equality analyses of wages and other incomes that affect individuals' disposable incomes over their lifetimes. The agency shall also submit proposals on how gender equality analyses of wage income and other incomes can be carried out regularly. The assignment must be finalized by June 2023 at the latest.
Sanne Lennström (S)
Mr. Speaker! When I submitted the interpellation, it was against the background that there was a seminar here in the Riksdag called Lön all day. The Minister also participated in the seminar.
The seminar presented a report showing how long women work during a workday and receive pay. It turned out that women now work for free after 16:12, which was one minute more according to the report. The man, on the other hand, is paid for the entire workday until 17:00. This applies despite the fact that women are more highly educated than men are today.
The Minister mentions in his answer to me that the wage gaps have decreased over time, which is indeed true and of course also positive. But the limit for when we believe we have achieved equal pay is a limit that is constantly being moved. Right now, it is at 2043, according to Lön hela dagen.
So, indications are now coming that the fight for equal pay is not only progressing very slowly but is even regressing or stagnating for the first time in 15 years. Just as the Minister mentions, there are different types of pay gaps that we can discuss here today. But I hope that we can nevertheless agree that these pay gaps exist and that we together want to do what we can to close these gaps. Therefore, I am also very grateful that the Minister is participating in the debate here today.
The Minister of State is a minister in a right-conservative government but also belongs to the party Liberalerna. Liberala kvinnor is a member organization in the campaign Lön hela dagen. The campaign does not only produce statistics, but one also reviews which concrete measures could create more equal wages and reverse the wage trend for women.
Number one on the list of measures is an equal parental insurance. The Minister may recall that during the Lön hela dagen-seminar, there was a panel with the labor market parties who unanimously answered the question: What could be done to change the development of women's wages? What could be done that would give the most boost to changing this negative trend? Everyone answered the same thing: One must create a more equal withdrawal from the parental insurance.
I note that this is something the Minister brings up in passing in her response to me. She says: In addition to the fact that men generally have higher salaries than women, the total wage incomes are also affected by the fact that it is significantly more common for women to work part-time and be on parental leave, as well as that they take greater responsibility for home and care work.
I think this deserves a slightly larger part of today's debate. The government says that it wants more equal wages. It also wants a more equal withdrawal. This has been put forward in this chamber by Minister Tenje, among others. This is an issue that Tenje also said was about women's own empowerment, quite literally.
The labor market parties also say, for example during the panel debate, that we need a more equal withdrawal. The Liberal women behind Minister Brandberg also stand behind this.
Therefore, I want to ask the Minister: How does the Minister for Equality intend to achieve a more equal uptake of our parental leave in order to create more equal wages?
Åsa Eriksson (S)
Mr. Speaker and Minister! It sounds good that it is a priority goal for the government to increase economic equality. That is what we agree on; that is how it should be. But the question is what the Minister and the government are actually doing. So far, we have not seen much of that. What we see instead is a development moving in the opposite direction.
Mr. Speaker! Workers in female-dominated professions in the welfare sector have lower wages than those in comparable male-dominated professions. Workers in female-dominated professions in the welfare sector have worse conditions than those in comparable male-dominated professions. And not only are their wages lower and their conditions worse; they also have far too few colleagues who can perform the work that those the welfare sector is for need.
Mr. Speaker! A full 42 percent of Kommunals members who work in elderly care consider their workplace to be understaffed - 42 percent! And 49 percent of the municipal workers who work in preschool say that their workplace is understaffed. That is almost half.
This is what reality looks like. It is high time to act, Minister, if the government is serious about economic equality being a priority. For, Mr. Speaker, when the shortage of colleagues becomes too great, it leads to risks in the work. When the shortage of colleagues becomes too great, it risks leading to the users not receiving the care or support they are entitled to. And when the shortage of colleagues becomes too great, it leads to stress and mental ill-health among all those who run, run, and run faster and faster and deprioritize their own needs but still experience that they are not enough.
Mr. Speaker! We cannot have it this way. It is already difficult for the municipalities to find staff, but with even greater pressure and no greater clarity on the agreement side, it will not become easier to find people for the welfare sector. The situation in female-dominated welfare professions is acute.
In order for employers within the welfare sector to have the opportunity to improve conditions and, for example, be able to offer full-time positions to everyone working there, especially women, so that they can increase their income and we can close the income gap between men and women, the government needs to invest in higher state grants to the municipalities now that costs are skyrocketing.
My question to the Minister is: What does the Minister intend to do to ensure that wages in female-dominated welfare professions are in parity with comparable male-dominated professions?
Sofia Amloh (S)
Mr. Speaker! Thank you, the interpellor, for the opportunity to debate these important issues tonight! Thanks also to the Minister - both for the answer and for allowing us to have this debate!
We had a similar interpellation debate in December, if I don't remember entirely incorrectly – as an introduction to the parliamentary term, I can imagine. I have also listened to the answer to this interpellation. It is still somewhat the same thing. Even in December, the Minister stated that economic equality was important for the government. Both now and in December, I heard the Minister state a number of things – a number of reasons why we have the lack of economic equality that we have. It is about what the causes are: the part-time work, the family policy when it comes to the uneven withdrawal of parental days, and a number of other things. Nothing is mentioned about pensions, and I could continue on that track.
Furthermore, the Minister states that more facts and the acquisition of more analyses are needed in order to be able to submit proposals. I believe we have that. I also believe that the interpellor was clear about that, partly from the seminar, partly from things that have emerged for other reasons.
What has happened then since December, or since the government took office and clearly put forward this ambition? It is a number of things. Among other things, the first thing the government did was remove the feminist foreign policy. I think that in the world we live in today, we perhaps do not need less of the feminist foreign policy. But it is a clear signal from the government that one should not have a feminist foreign policy.
Then we move on to the government arriving at a budget and presenting it. And what do we see there? When SKR is clear about what is needed to maintain the same quality in municipalities and regions in the welfare system, one-third of the government is found in the budget. Two-thirds of the money is missing. What happens then? It becomes a fairly large hole and a minus. Who will this hit? It will not result in fewer shared shifts and part-time work. It is full-time work that many of our welfare women need. That will not happen with these non-moneys, the money that this budget lacks.
Who can we see are the winners in the government's budget? Well, it was the men. The men drew the winning ticket in this budget, not the women. Economic gender equality policy and economic independence are lacking.
My question is the one we were discussing, namely when it comes to a more equal distribution of parental days. I know that the Minister was clear in the interpellation debate in December that this changes norms. Where are the ideas and proposals in politics? Where are the investigations that can lead to something in this area? I miss that. Perhaps I can get an answer to that today.
Jim Svensk Larm (S)
Mr. Speaker! I would like to begin by thanking the Minister for Equality for the answer. I am pleased that the government says this is a prioritized issue, but I am somewhat concerned about the lack of concrete measures from the government.
In an interpellation debate on December 6, which Member of Parliament Sofia Amloh raised, the wage gap in the labor market between women and men was discussed. The Minister explained then that the government had only been in office for seven weeks but was positive about using tools to shift norms. At that time, we could not get any concrete examples of which tools the government wanted to use to change the norms. Now the government has had about five months to reflect, but the answers from the government still echo hollowly. The toolbox still looks unused.
The Minister of Justice highlights the importance of salary mapping, but otherwise, she raises no ideas on how we should reduce the wage gap that exists. In the government's news on International Women's Day regarding the unequal wages, the government says: The government will monitor this carefully going forward. It sounds almost a bit comical when one only monitors and monitors.
We now see how costs are increasing for many families as food becomes more expensive and rents are raised. Just one debate today will unfortunately not help any family manage the bills this month, but we can take responsibility for improving things for women in the future, for our children and grandchildren, so that the gender pay gap hopefully disappears completely.
A week ago, my social media feed was filled with engaged people. Examples were taken. Involuntary part-time work, increased stress, uneven distribution of power, and unpaid housework were just some of the examples that were raised. I hope, Mr. Speaker, that all of us here in the chamber are aware of what equality looks like in Sweden today – that women have lower wages and worse conditions, work part-time to a greater extent, and take greater responsibility in the home and in the unpaid housework.
To address this, it is important that we are aware of how it looks, that the issue is discussed, and that we want to do something about it. Therefore, I become concerned when I read in a survey presented last week that more than every fourth person believes that we already have equal pay in Sweden. It irritates me that we do not have a consensus that this is something we need to work on. We know that the pay gaps increased most recently.
This is not something that can disappear in a notice or because International Women's Day has passed. This is something we must discuss every day to address the problems and reduce the gaps, or preferably remove them.
Approximately 48 minutes per working day, women work for free, according to the latest statistics. But then comes the next part of the statistics, which I think is being missed in this discussion. We compare wages based on everyone working full-time, but that is not the reality. Among workers with permanent employment, only 44 percent of women work full-time, according to LO. For white-collar occupations, the corresponding figure is 69 percent. It then becomes very skewed to compare with full-time. If a woman in a manual occupation were to receive full-time, it would result in a higher salary of 5,100 kronor. It is important that we talk based on reality and do not make this invisible.
The government says that unequal wages are a priority and shall be monitored closely. Why does the government say nothing about the importance of an equal parental leave? As the Minister mentioned in his posts on December 6, a reformed parental leave has pushed norms. What is the next step to move norms and make the parental leave more equal?
Statsrådet Paulina Brandberg (L)
Mr. Speaker! I thank the members for an important debate on an important issue.
Pay differences are important to talk about. However, I usually prefer to talk about lifetime earnings. All economic differences between men and women must be seen in that perspective. There, of course, pay differences are an incredibly important part, and there the question of, for example, part-time work becomes something that one weighs in a better way when talking about lifetime earnings.
When it comes to wages, there are different things one must look at. For example, we have this that men and women to a large extent still work within different sectors, where the typically female-dominated occupations are not as well-paid as the male-dominated occupations. So, that naturally should not be the case.
As the members surely know, wage setting in Sweden is handled by the parties. From the government's side, however, we have tools in the form of conducting mappings, through among others the Medling Institute, to make this visible so that the parties can truly counteract the differences that exist.
Furthermore, we have the fact that men and women work different amounts. Women take more of the parental leave, women work more part-time, and women are also significantly more frequently on sick leave than men.
From this perspective, I am very glad that I am not only the Minister for Equality but also the Deputy Minister for Employment. This issue of part-time work and sick leaves is a very important issue for me in that role. There, I have the Swedish Work Environment Authority as one of my agencies. I will, of course, work hard during this mandate period so that we can achieve a better work environment so that we get fewer sick leaves from work, something that I see as an incredibly important equality measure.
A third question we must look at when we look at wage differences is, of course, discrimination. In cases where pure discrimination occurs, that someone receives a lower salary for the same work solely because of gender, it is of course incredibly important to take measures against this. The Equality Ombudsman is the authority that has oversight over this, and I will also work to ensure that the Equality Ombudsman is given the best possible tools to follow up on this.
I can note that the members say things such as why has nothing happened, that it is going too slowly and that it is high time for the government to act. I would then like to remind the members that they have been in power for eight years. I have been a minister for barely five months. New legislation and new measures take time. Over eight years, one should of course have managed to address a good deal of the things that one considers problematic, but when it comes to legislative work and such measures, it takes time. This is, however, something that I will work on both in the role of Minister for Equality and as Deputy Minister for Employment.
I would very much welcome more debates on this issue so that I can continuously account for which measures the government is taking within this area.
Sanne Lennström (S)
Mr. Speaker! I must thank the Minister for the answers provided so far. I am fully aware that the parental leave does not naturally belong only to the Minister for Equality's portfolio but also to Minister Tenjes' portfolio. But since an equal parental leave is perhaps one of the most important tools the government has to create equal pay, which is today's topic of debate, I still want to continue on that track. I felt, however, that we did not receive a proper answer there.
In Sweden, we are proud of our parental leave. Fathers take many more father days or parental leave days compared to in many other countries. But there is still a great deal to be done before the usage can be counted as equal. Women take approximately 70 percent of the days, and men take approximately 30 percent of the days. It is an increase. It is going in the right direction. But we also see that a third of all children have a father who does not take any parental leave days.
I could devote the entire debate to talking about all the advantages of an equal parental leave and sharing the child's time equally with its parents. But since the debate is about equal wages, we shall jump straight to the consequences of us not having an equal take of the parental leave.
Both I and the Minister know very well that the wage consequences for women will be large with the order we have today. The wage differences soar most when a child has come into the world. The woman is at home with the child for the greater part of the time. She subsequently gets a worse career and a lower wage, works part-time more often, and takes more vab. We have heard many of the consequences earlier during this debate.
All this has major consequences for the amount that lands in the woman's salary account later. In the end, it also affects the woman's income even after she has stopped working. Women have 30 percent lower pensions than men. There are also significantly more women who are poor pensioners in today's Sweden.
We have seen right-wing governments try to implement reforms in the family economic area before, without success. The child support became an integration trap. The so-called equality bonus was something few knew about and even fewer actually used. What has had an effect are actually reforms that S-governments have implemented. For example, starting to reserve days in the parental leave has seen a clear effect.
With wages comes also freedom. And with increased wages follows even more freedom. Therefore, I continue the long-standing debate on the parental leave and its impact on women's wages.
I would like to ask the Minister: How can we reform the parental leave system to create a more equal uptake, which in the long run can also lead to more equal wages? That is the question I would really like to get an answer to here today.
Åsa Eriksson (S)
Mr. Speaker! I and the Social Democrats agree with much of what the Minister said in his latest entry and how the Minister describes how it looks. But I missed answers to our questions. But the Minister will get more chances.
The Minister spoke wisely about living income. It is very important, perhaps actually even more important than talking about wage differences, even though those are also important.
Just as the Minister says, the wages are negotiated by the parties. But a large proportion of the working women who work part-time have municipalities as employers. In order for they to be able to be offered full-time and working conditions and a work environment that enables them to manage working full-time, the municipalities must receive cost coverage now that inflation is soaring and costs are increasing. Otherwise, the working women will instead have fewer colleagues, worse conditions, and neither be offered full-time nor be able to manage working full-time. It is a matter of equality.
I expect the Minister to ensure that the government is influenced in the negotiations regarding the government bill so that there are substantial supplements to the municipalities to improve working women's employment rates and working conditions, so that they can manage to work full-time. It is important.
Politics is about priorities. We have seen so far that the right-conservative government prioritizes tax cuts for the richest, such as the minister and myself. I believe that we do not need that. The government should instead prioritize more money for welfare so that working women can get reasonable working conditions, increase their lifetime income, and then receive a pension that they can live on.
I ask for the second time: What does the Minister intend to do so that wages in female-dominated welfare occupations are in parity with comparable male-dominated occupations?
Sofia Amloh (S)
Mr. Speaker! I completely agree with the Minister regarding the description of living incomes given in the answer. I completely agree with the entire description that was just given. That was done in the answer, and it has been done previously. It is not that picture we are missing. We are in complete agreement on that and it will probably continue to be so.
I am just highly curious. I do not need to receive a full program with bullet points yet regarding what needs to be done. I am requesting proposals, ideas, intentions, on which areas and roughly what the government intends to tackle. Is it the family policy? Is it at the Ministry of Employment where things will happen regarding leveling economic inequality? Are more inquiries to be appointed to look at something specific? What are the directives?
I do not need to receive concrete, finished proposals from the Minister. However, I can think that one should have some points clear on what one wants to implement when one takes power and is to govern. But we can wait a few more months for something to come from the government.
Instead, the government seeks conflict with the Social Democrats, which was done in a debate article this week. It is a pity. It is perhaps not exactly conflict but cooperation that should be sought with the Social Democrats.
I have done it in the speaker's chair before and intend to continue to stand here and extend a hand to the Minister and say that our hand is there. I conclude by doing so even today.
Jim Svensk Larm (S)
Mr. Speaker! I would like to thank the Minister for the contribution. It is a topic that is touching and important to discuss. Unfortunately, we did not get very many answers to our questions. But the Minister highlighted, among other things, that the labor market is gender-segregated. We have male-dominated and female-dominated workplaces. That can be an explanation for wage differences.
Yesterday, a report was released on how sexual harassment at work increases economic inequality. I do not know if the Minister has had time to read it yet. But in the report, it is pointed out, among other things, that women avoid workplaces where the majority of colleagues are men, as a result of a greater risk of sexual harassment. It is also pointed out that women often leave those workplaces and go to lower-paid workplaces with fewer male colleagues. This results in women taking a lower salary in order not to be subjected to sexual harassment.
It is important to work preventatively against this, in order to achieve a better work environment but also a more equal labor market. It is about shifting norms.
Then we come back to what we talked about earlier. Moving norms is important. Therefore, I want to return to the parental leave. The Swedish parental leave is something we should be proud of. It gives us the opportunity to be with our children and to be active in parenthood during a time that will never come back. Therefore, it is important to constantly strive to make the parental leave more equal. This applies to both the regular parental leave and the sick leave (vab). We see that women also here take a greater responsibility for the children and are at home when they are sick.
Moving norms is, as said, important, and moving towards a more equal distribution of the parental leave is an important mission. Why not move towards more reserved days or months in the parental leave?
Statsrådet Paulina Brandberg (L)
Mr. Speaker! As a Liberal, I am happy to speak about the parental leave, for it is an issue that is close to my party. We have also been involved in shifting norms through the parental leave that exists today. I believe that the months which are often somewhat carelessly called "daddy months" have been very important for shifting norms, because that is largely what this is about. I believe it was Member Sofia Amloh who spoke about that there are many reasons for this.
I thought Jim Svensk Larm was on a good point when he said that the issue is actually not just about wage differences but also about achieving a more balanced family policy - for the children's sake and also for the fathers' sake, so that they form a better connection with their children. It is a separate debate, but I believe it is important when talking about these issues not to call this a measure for the women's sake, because then I think it will take longer to shift the norms. I believe one must talk about this because that is how you get a better society, better balanced families and of course reduced wage differences.
Mr. Speaker! We are now in a time with many parallel crises. One of them was, of course, the pandemic, the aftermath of which we are still living in and which began under the Social Democratic government. During the pandemic years, the wage gap between men and women increased after having decreased for a longer period.
I will not stand here and say that it is the Social Democrats' policy that has caused the wage gaps to increase, for this naturally has a reasonable explanation in times of pandemic. Now, there is also war, a recession, and major economic problems. This makes these issues more important than ever to monitor, map out, and mitigate the negative effects of. I will do that, but there will, of course, be greater challenges given the situation we find ourselves in.
I will look at the occupations where women have a worse working environment and lower wages than men and see what can be done to mitigate the negative effects. This applies, for example, of course, to how things look in the municipalities. When it comes to the parental leave, it is, as mentioned, a very important issue to talk about. The Government has also indicated that we will continue to look at how it can be improved, for example by looking at the so-called "double days" and whether changes can be made there. But I will not be satisfied with that.
I think the development has gone too slowly, even before the pandemic. During the eight years that the Social Democrats ruled, I thought the development went too slowly. Women and men should have significantly more equal wages than what is had today. Now that I have taken over the ministerial post, I will do everything in my power to ensure that the development goes as quickly as possible in the right direction, despite the challenges that exist in the outside world.
Sanne Lennström (S)
Mr. Speaker! I am pleased that the Minister mentions that she values an equal parental leave and thinks that the issue of equal pay is very important, because it is exactly as the Minister says, there are great advantages for everyone involved with an equal take. But the Minister governs together with the Christian Democrats and with the support of the Sweden Democrats, and in the election these parties were clear that they want to abolish the reserved months for each parent. Since then, a work-life-balance directive from the EU has also arrived which says that one must have at least two months, so it is not possible to abolish all three reserved months.
In the budget, the government also states that they want to make the parental leave more flexible. I had intended to ask what that flexibility entails, but the Minister did mention the so-called "double days" and that the government wants to increase the number of such days. It is a proposal that we Social Democrats look forward to discussing. How many shall these double days be? What will the design be?
I am, of course, curious about how the government will proceed in those issues in light of what the Sverigedemokraterna and Kristdemokraterna said during the election campaign. Is there any more flexibility that will be looked at than the double days? Will the reserved months be looked at? I want to discuss the issue further regarding how the parental leave can be used to create more equal wages.
Statsrådet Paulina Brandberg (L)
Mr. Speaker! During an election campaign, all parties act individually and talk about which paths they want to take. When a government is then formed, it is, of course, a matter of discussion. I cannot take responsibility for what the Kristdemokraterna said during the election campaign. I can say that at the moment, there is no proposal on the government's table to abolish the reserved months that exist today. The agreement that exists is that the government will continue to look at the parental leave, and before we are finished with those discussions, I have no possibility of standing here and making any promises. The government parties will discuss the issue and return as soon as possible regarding how we intend to proceed.
This is an important issue, not least now. It is important to mitigate as quickly as possible the negative effects that the parallel crises that are unfortunately occurring have on equality. This was something the Social Democrats also experienced during their time in government.
In conclusion, I just want to thank you for the debate. This is, as I said at the beginning, a very important issue. It is ultimately about the living income, and there, the wage differences are an incredibly important part. Thank you very much for the debate!
Source: The Swedish Parliament. The speeches come from the open data of the Riksdag, translated into English by AI, which may contain errors.