Pay parity needs to be embedded into the architecture of future and emerging industries in order to avoid gender inequality in a net zero economy, advocates say.
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Advocacy groups are urging the federal government to prioritise reducing pay gaps across sectors at its upcoming jobs and skills summit and claim more needs to be done to boost wages in feminised industries.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers, in his issue paper released last Wednesday, outlined a need to create better opportunities for women in the workforce, while Minister for Women and Finance, Katy Gallagher confirmed income equality would play a key role in Labor's summit and ongoing economic strategy.
Latest figures have placed the gender pay gap at 14.1 per cent, prompting groups such Equality Rights Alliance to say the need for discussion is well overdue.
Speaking to ACM, Equality Rights Alliance manager Helen Dalley-Fisher said the incorporation of equality into the discussion was welcomed and showed a "change of mindset" compared to previous governments.
"The really interesting thing we're finding with the job summit is that it lines up a lot with the calls that go right back to the March for Justice, where people were calling for really big structural change," Ms Dalley-Fisher said.
"So that's everything from re-evaluating the wage equation in care-dominated industries which tend to be female dominated, and all the way through to the way we value the work done by women and the way we tend to devalue work done on flexibility."
The Australian Council of Trade Unions, the Australian Hotels Association and the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry all support greater steps to close gender pay disparity across the economy.
Average weekly earnings data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed the pay gap between men and women for full-time employment had widened.
Minister for women and finance Katy Gallagher said a widening pay gap was the "wrong direction" and confirmed reversing it would be a priority.
"Any increase to the gender pay gap is an undeniable step in the wrong direction," Senator Gallagher said.
"In recognising that gender impact assessment and the consideration of women's experiences must become part of core business of government, women's economic equality will be a key focus of all sessions of the jobs and skills summit."
The ACT senator also noted the government would seek to implement greater public and transparent gender pay reporting across all sectors of the economy.
Labor has committed to implementing the recommendations of the Workplace Gender Equality Act review, which would require businesses with more than a 100 employees to publicly report pay gaps.
Companies refusing to report would be at risk of not receiving future government contracts.
Ms Dalley-Fisher hoped emerging industries, such as renewables, don't inherit systems entrenched with income inequality.
"We have an opportunity to get those industries right from the start," she said.
"It's going to be critical that we don't replicate the problems we've got within gendered workplaces elsewhere."
ACTU president Michele O'Neil said Australia is placed as one of the worst performers on pay equity in the OECD.
She also highlighted existing skills shortages and a lack of childcare was exacerbating the problem.
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"We've got claims of skill and labour shortages but we've got many women, in fact over 130,000 last year, who wanted to work but couldn't. Because they had caring responsibilities and couldn't get support for care for children or others that they were caring for," Ms O'Neil said.
Equality Rights Alliance also believes existing enterprise bargaining agreements are usually a detriment to a woman's earning capacity.
"Women are socialised to not engage in conflict and to please others," Ms Dalley-Fisher said.
"Enterprise bargaining arrangements are good in that they take the negotiation side of individual positions, but the very antagonistic way in which those negotiations are sometimes conducted is problematic."
The federal government's issue paper outlines improving women's participation rates across the economy, particularly in sectors with skill shortages.
Minister Gallagher said a women's economic taskforce would be established in the coming weeks and will be designed in reducing gender inequality.
"The work doesn't end at the Jobs and Skills Summit, though," she said.
"The Women's Economic Equality Taskforce which will be announced in coming weeks will advise on a range of economic issues and help inform a National Strategy to Achieve Gender Equality that will set an ambitious national agenda to drive generational change and provide a roadmap for whole-of-community action over the coming years."
