Women get paid less despite being more educated

Melbourne, August 6 (ANI): More Australian women than men are taking admission at university, but female graduates end up getting paid less when they enter the workforce, a new study has revealed.

The salary difference is particularly more glaring at higher levels of qualification, something not seen in many other developed nations.

The Australian Centre for Educational Research briefing found that the pay of higher education graduates was more than 50 percent higher than of workers without a degree.

Between 1998 and 2009, Australia was one of a number of countries where females made up more than 50 percent of new university students.

However, the paper found that women with tertiary qualifications in Australia earned about 72 percent of what men with the same qualifications earned.

The gap is huge than in Germany, New Zealand and UK.

Dr Daniel Edwards, ACER senior research fellow and co-author of the paper, said that the resultant data was concerning.

"While Australia is not alone on this point, the fact that the discrepancy in earnings between men and women is larger among the more highly qualified cohort is of concern and is not replicated in a number of other countries," News.com.au quoted him as saying.

The research found that Australia had a large number of university-qualified people, a level reached relatively recently compared with other nations, which have experienced high attainment levels for generations.

The research comes as about 400,000 students from 40 universities are surveyed on the core aspects of their university experience. (ANI)