SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, Nov. 28 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The average salary of women in the Canary Islands is 13.46 euros per hour compared to 13.73 euros per hour for men, which means that the wage gap in the Canary Islands, with the most recent data (2020), is 1.87% and you work seven free days a year.
This difference is so low because men and women in the Canary Islands “are equalized below”, that is, with very low salaries, close to the Minimum Interprofessional Wage (SMI), the Secretary of Equality of the UGT Canarias has detailed this Monday at a press conference. , Mirna Ortega, during the presentation of the report ‘I work for free’.
Among the union’s demands is the reversal of the burden of proof, that is, that it is the denounced company that must demonstrate that the wages are equal and comply with the law.
In the European Union (EU) women earn 13% less per hour than men on average, which is equivalent to a month and a half of salary per year (47 days of salary).
For this reason, the European Commission marks November 15 as a symbolic day to raise awareness of the fact that women workers in Europe continue to earn less on average than their male colleagues, collects a note from the UGT.
In Spain, UGT states that women earn 9.4% less than men in hourly wages, which means 34 days a year that they work for free.
The case of Spain is more striking since it starts from a wage gap in 2010 of 16.2% that rose to 18.7% in 2012 and has been reduced to 9.4% in 2020, which places it in eighth place. position of the lowest wage gaps in hourly wage.
From the UGT they point out that Spain has an agreement on the Minimum Interprofessional Wage that must continue to be “maintained and claimed” for its increase in the coming years and with a Royal Decree on Pay Equality that will allow Spanish workers to know the reasons for their discrimination salary “and eliminate, correct and prevent them”.
Thus, the organization celebrates the approval on October 4, by the Council of the EU, of the European Directive on the adequacy of legal minimum wages, which will contribute to achieving decent living and working conditions for women workers and the workers of Europe.
UGT considers “especially relevant” the inclusion of strengthening the participation of the social partners throughout the decision-making process in setting and updating the legal minimum wages.
The union pays tribute this Monday at the El Tranvía Citizen Center (La Cuesta, La Laguna), posthumously, to Juan Pedro García Rivero, a tobacco industry worker and union activist since the time he went underground.
