Women in the IT Industry: Between Sexism & Gender Pay Gap

Lately, the IT and startup scene has made a name for itself with some sexism scandals. How it really is about that Women a look at the current salary statistics shows.

Sexism in the IT industry

Even if some of the most influential positions in the tech scene - such as Facebook (Sheryl Sandberg), Yahoo (Marissa Mayer) or Youtube (Susan Wojcicki) are occupied by women, the scene keeps making itself heard through sexism and discrimination:

There is about the Case Ellen Paowho sued her former employer, venture capitalist Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers, for sexual discrimination.

From Ellen Pao to Jacob Appelbaum

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There is the escort scandal at the latest NOAH Conference at the beginning of June in Berlin: The NOAH is considered the sign of the German digital scene. At the evening party, however, they apparently tried to get through the low proportion of women among speakers and participants Employees of an escort service to lift.

And there are the allegations against him Internetactivist Jacob Appelbaum, previously a prominent figurehead of the Tor project, which he left in early June amid numerous allegations of sexual harassment and abuse.

Is the IT and tech industry latent misogynist?

These scandals are finally flanked by countless anti-feminist comments in the discussion forums of tech sites such as Heise.

It is therefore all the more interesting to take a look at the salary structure in this Industry throw: Are women systematically discriminated against in the IT and tech industry? Is the scene latently misogynistic? And can that be done on salary read, keyword Gender Pay Gap?

Small differences in content are not friendly to women

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The Salary Comparison Portal http://gehalt.de did just that and looked at the salaries of women in the scene - and comes to interesting conclusions: Although the gender pay gap is less than in other industries - but that is only with the particularly assertive women of the scene together.

Or, to put it plausively, the low differences in salary are not necessarily women-friendly. Why this is so, illustrate the figures that came out in the investigation. The sound first of all positive:

Women in the IT and Tech Industry: A Salary Check

Therefore to earn Women with a scientific background in IT project management are best. Her annual income here is 67.144 euros. This is followed by product management with an average of 64.443 euros and a position in technical research and development with 63.989 euros per year. Jobs in actuarial mathematics (63.968 euros) and in management consulting (62.217 euros) are also lucrative.

The highest salaries for women in the technical field also include three professions from engineering: the sales engineer with a salary of 58.392 euros, the engineer in production with 55.029 euros and in electronicsTechnology with 53.947 euros. Another topJob is IT consulting (58.093 euros), followed by the regulatory affairs manager working in the pharmaceutical industry with 56.601 euros per year.

So high is the gender pay gap in IT

The gender pay gap, i.e. the difference between men’s and women’s salaries, also looks encouraging at first glance. Because the pay gap in the evaluated professions is clear lower than the average 23 percent across all industries.

It is between 2,2 percent in actuarial and the maximum of 17 percent in product management. Overall, the wage gap between male and female employees in the occupations studied is in the majority below 10 percent.

The methodology

If you would like to know more about the methodology at this point, we examined the total 4.812 remuneration data from the last 12 months. The highest paid professions were identified for women from the scientific and technical environment.

Both male and female academics from the study programs Mathematics, Computer Science, Natural Sciences and Technology (MINT) were considered. All data are employees without disciplinary personnel responsibility.

Women must be particularly strong in IT

A reason for joy? Not at all. The investigation also reveals that the proportion of women in the industry is frighteningly low. Philip Bierbach, Managing Director of Lohn.de, draws a surprising conclusion:

“According to our evaluation, the professions in which a degree in a technical or scientific subject forms the basis have a very low proportion of women of 11 percent. When female employees assert themselves in these male-dominated professions, the structure of the remuneration is often above average. This has a positive effect on the wage gap. ”

That's why women turn their backs on the industry

It also shows how difficult it is for the industry to make women overall. No wonder, then, that some well-educated computer scientists turn their backs on her - and then change back into typical women's occupations.

So were in the ZEIT recently ported two sisters, both with a diploma in computer engineering, who after a few years started their own consulting and development jobs - with a cosmetic institute. The reasons for the radical change are also given in the article: The industry is too male-dominated and driven by competition. And the bottom line is:

With the IT, it has now concluded, the women share in the industry must increase others.

Conclusion: It also depends on the small differences

The statement is symptomatic. When it comes to the fact that women are still underrepresented in the IT and tech industry, we must certainly talk about differences in content and open sexism.

However, this is not carried out systematically, but rather seems to be inherent in the system: It is therefore important to also address the differences in mindset and corporate culture, which women in particular also have to deal with Family still make it difficult to gain a foothold in the IT and tech industry and thus change the mentality step by step. Because only then can you sustained something different.

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