Swiss Enact Gender Pay Gap Reporting Requirement for Companies

(Bloomberg) -- Swiss companies will be required to look into whether they pay men and women equitably, an issue that led to a country-wide day of protest earlier this year.

The law obliges companies with more than 100 employees to prepare an independently vetted report examining pay by mid 2021 and share the results of the analysis with staff. Firms will have to repeat the exercise every four years unless they find no evidence of an unexplained wage differential, the government said on Wednesday.

As in most industrialized countries, gender-based discrimination in the workplace is illegal in Switzerland, but -- just as elsewhere -- women still typically earn less than men do.

In enacting a requirement for pay reporting, Switzerland is following in the footsteps of Britain, which has already begun forcing companies to publish data. But progress may be additionally handicapped by the Swiss stigma often associated with the idea of women working full time.

The new rules, which end automatically on July 1, 2032, will cover 46% of Switzerland’s workforce.

To contact the reporter on this story: Catherine Bosley in Zurich at cbosley1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Fergal O'Brien at fobrien@bloomberg.net, Zoe Schneeweiss, Lucy Meakin

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