Australia's latest taxation statistics report from the ATO has revealed something many of us already suspected: the gender pay gap persists. The most striking finding though? Men earn more than women in almost 96 per cent of occupations.
Data analysed by the Australia Institute and published by The Point reveals a troubling reality within the Australian workforce that even when men and women hold the exact same job title, men are likely to take home more money by the end of the financial year.
Below, we've broken down the biggest takeaways from the ATO's latest taxation report.
The gender pay gap is everywhere
After looking at 1,000 different jobs in Australia, men have a higher average annual salary in 96 per cent of them. While the gender pay gap is clear, shown in WGEA data year after year, this statistic is still sobering. A frightening yet perhaps unsurprising number.
The ATO data shows that even in fields dominated primarily by women (like midwifery, where 98 per cent are women), men will still earn a higher average salary than women. In the midwifery example, men earn an average of $97,633 and women an average of $76,399.
In workplaces where gender ratio is relatively mixed (40 per cent women or more), there are just five instances where women earn more than their man counter parts. And those five specific roles are dishwashers, magistrates, fast-food cooks, university tutors and wool classers. It means that even when workplaces are nearly as likely to hire women and men, then men will almost always earn more.
High-paying vs low-paying fields
We're seeing the biggest difference in jobs men and women would "traditionally" do; these hold a higher influence on the overall wage gap. Men's "traditional" work pays a better salary. Meaning, jobs where more than 90 per cent of the employees are men, the average salary is $87,649. For women's "traditional" work, where there are 90 per cent of female employees, the average salary drops to $56,025. Of the 50 highest paying jobs in Australia, men have the higher average salary in 47 of them.
Why is this happening?
There isn't one specific for this answer. The gender pay gap is a layered, nuanced and systemic issue that involves everything from unequal caring responsibilities, unequal share of domestic labour and medical misogyny. But this report states the gender earnings gap widens over the course the financial year because men are statistically more likely or able to work full time, take extra shifts and overtime. They are also more likely to be offered or take on senior leadership roles within their workplace.
This situation is not improving either. This batch of data is based on tax numbers from 2023-2024. The last batch from 2018-2019 showed men had a higher salary in 94.3 per cent of occupations. It means the earnings gap has increased by 1.7 per cent.
The ATO earnings data is different from the WGEA gender pay gap data as the ATO data looks at what individuals actually earned at the end of a financial – not what their hourly rate or salary is said to be. Australia's gender pay gap in 2026 sits at 21.1% according to WGEA and 11.5% according to the ABS.
