Iceland has made it illegal to pay a man more than a woman for the same job
A new law has just gone into effect in Iceland which makes it illegal to pay men more than women for the same job.
The legislation, which was actually passed back in March but has only been effective since the New Year, will require all companies with 25 or more employees to undergo certification every three years to prove that they’re following the new rules.
Similar laws already exist in other countries, such as the US, making it illegal for companies to discriminate based on gender, but Iceland is the first to actually enforce it in this way. That’s why women who work full-time, year-round, on average still make just 80% of what men do—and the gender pay gap hasn’t closed in any significant way in nine years. What’s more, Iceland is already in the top spot on the World Economic Forum’s 2015 global gender gap index, followed closely by its Scandinavian friends Norway, Finland, and Sweden. Who’s moving?
Photo by Evelyn Paris on Unsplash