University salaries for male employees continued to outpace those of females in the 2008–2009 academic year. A recent Statistics Canada survey found discrepancies of up to $20,000.
There is a significant salary gap between male and female faculty at Carleton University, with male faculty earning $13,353 more on average than females.
Patrizia Gentile, an assistant professor of women’s and gender studies at Carleton, said she does not think salary disparity is specific to universities.
“I think it’s part of a much broader issue, that men and men’s work is often seen as something more valuable,” Gentile said.
Men and women who become professors at universities all have equivalent qualifications when applying to a teaching position, according to Gentile.
“It’s not that men have a PhD and women don’t. Everyone has equivalent qualifications, so why the salary discrepancy?” Gentile said.
James Turk, executive director of the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT), said he believes the salary gap is less than it would appear.
“The scale of the difference is less than it appears, when you break down people by rank, age and discipline. But there continues to be relatively lower pay for women,” Turk said.
CAUT statistics say female full professors in Ontario earn 95.4 per cent of what male full professors earn.
“The bad news is that the gap is still there. However, the gap is much less than what it would appear from the Statistics Canada survey,” Turk said.
Discrimination may not be the only factor in salary disparity. “We’re wrestling with a lot of other factors,” Turk said.
“Certain disciplines are paid better than others. Professors of chemistry are paid a lot more than professors of philosophy,” Turk said.
The percentage of women in academic fields has been rising, but still “trails dismally in higher paying fields such as chemistry,” Turk said.
“Even amongst the same rank, someone who became an associate professor recently will be paid less than someone who has been in that rank for 10 years,” Turk said.
In recent years, more women are getting hired, but they tend to start in the junior ranks, Turk said.
“There are more likely to be women in lower ranks than men, because men don’t do the same kind of primary or outside work as women do, with families,” Gentile said.
“Women’s lives and experiences are different. Our society still expects them to do things men don’t have to do. It affects women’s careers differently, and we need to take that into consideration,” Gentile said.
“Women’s careers are not going to look exactly like men’s, but they shouldn’t be penalized financially for this,” she said.