Equal, pay, women and men, for work, equal, value

In brief

Amendments to the Labour Code and to the Salary Law entered into force on 13 May 2022 aimed at ensuring equal pay between women and men for work of equal value.

In detail

Based on the amendments, employers are now required to ensure equal pay for equal work or work of equal value.

Thus, regardless of the applicable salary system, employers are required to:

• set up a system allowing the evaluation and classification of positions to establish the pay scale within the organisation. Such systems must exclude gender discrimination and prevent unjustified differences in salary payments for employees performing equal work and work of equal value.
• ensure equal pay for male and female employees for equal work or work of equal value.
• make available to employees, in an easily accessible way, information on the criteria used for the system of evaluation and classification of positions for determining the salary levels applied in the organisation.
• inform employees about the average remuneration by category of employees or positions, broken down by gender.

Moreover, employers who are medium and large enterprises[i] are required to inform employees and/or their representatives periodically, at least once a year (at the latest in the six months of the year following the financial year), about the gender pay gap by category of employees and positions.

To assess whether the employees perform work of equal value, the following work-related factors will be considered, including:

• level of responsibility,
• qualification and experience,
• effort and nature of the duties to be performed,
• work conditions.

If the gender pay gap exceeds 5% and the employer cannot justify these differences by objective and gender-neutral factors, the employer is required to remedy the situation.

Each employee has the right to obtain information on the remuneration scale, broken down by gender, for categories of employees who perform equal work or work of equal value.

The authorities responsible for enforcing and ensuring compliance with these provisions are the State Labour Inspectorate and the Council for Preventing and Eliminating Discrimination and Ensuring Equality. Those authorities are entitled to request clarifications and additional information from employers regarding the gender pay gap and differences between men’s and women’s pay that may not be justified by objective factors.

[Source: Law no. 107 of 21 April 2022 for the amendment of some normative acts, published in the Official Monitor no. 141-150 dated 13 May 2022]

The takeaway

Legal provisions amending important labour and salary laws entered into force on 13 May 2022.

[i] The criteria for defining medium and large enterprises were established in the Law on accounting and financial reporting no. 287/2017