Equal value, equal pay: Concepts, mechanisms and implementation towards gender pay equity
Publicat: 15 December 2025
This report presents an in-depth compilation of evidence and analysis on how the EU’s principle of equal pay for the same work and work of equal value can be implemented in practice, with a particular focus on work of equal value – thus, pay equity. According to this principle, when two jobs can be regarded as equivalent in terms of skills, effort, responsibilities and working conditions, they should be remunerated equally. But how can such equivalence be established? Beyond general guidance provided by national legislation and court interpretations, the EU Pay Transparency Directive, to be incorporated into national law by June 2026, requires companies to ensure that, among other key obligations, their pay structures are based on objective, gender-neutral and bias-free job evaluation methods. This report moves from principle to practice by bridging legal requirements, best practices and workplace realities, drawing on 16 case studies that examine the practical application of tools and methods, company-level initiatives and the role of social partners in implementing job classification reviews within sectoral collective agreements. Although the report highlights success stories, significant challenges persist. The European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound) is a tripartite European Union Agency established in 1975. Its role is to provide knowledge in the area of social, employment and work-related policies according to Regulation (EU) 2019/127.
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Equal pay for the same work is well established, but equal pay for work of equal value – comparing roles with similar skills, effort, working conditions and responsibility – is not yet widely understood or applied. Strengthening this principle is essential for real progress on gender pay equality.
Job evaluations are often assumed to be gender-neutral, yet this confidence may be misplaced. Poor levels of understanding allow the undervaluation of work in female-dominated jobs to persist.
Creating a gender-neutral compensation system involves five stages – planning, designing, implementation, monitoring and reporting – and each demands deliberate safeguards. Representative participation, gender-equality training, consideration of emotional labour and regular audits are critical to keeping the process on track.
Implementing equal pay for work of equal value remains challenging with resistance to change or denial of existing pay gaps as well as technical difficulties impeding progress. Limited data, subjective scoring and resource constraints also slow reforms.
Social partners are critical to ensuring that pay structures in collective agreements are gender-neutral. However, reviewing job classifications and correcting unjustified pay gaps is often a lengthy process. Wage drift, individual negotiations and the absence of pay scales can make this task even more difficult.
In the context of a slowly reducing gender pay gap and reinforced policy efforts to address the issue, one key measure focuses on systemically addressing the undervaluation of jobs typically performed by women. The principle of equal pay not only ensures that workers doing the same job have the right to be paid the same but also extends to work of equal value. Work of equal value in principle means that when two jobs can be regarded as equivalent in terms of skills, effort, responsibilities and working conditions, they should be remunerated equally. Individual differences due to seniority, qualification or performance may still justify pay differentials. This report takes a deep dive into how the principle is implemented in practice in the EU, moving from contexts and concepts to practice, and based on 16 real-life cases, exploring how gender-neutral job evaluations are applied in different settings. The case studies examine tools and methodologies, collective agreements, companies’ approaches and cases related to supports, controls and certifications, to illustrate how the ‘work of equal value’ principle has been implemented in a gender-neutral way, and where this implementation may have fallen short. The report is intended for all those (social partners, company managers, governmental institutions and others) working to eliminate the structural undervaluation of women’s work and direct and indirect pay discrimination.
The principle of equal pay for equal work or work of equal value has evolved significantly within the EU’s legal framework over more than six decades. Established in Article 119 of the 1957 Treaty of Rome (now Article 157 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union), the 1970s saw a pivotal expansion with the Equal Pay Directive (Council Directive 75/117/EEC), which introduced the concept of ‘work to which equal value is attributed’ (Article 1) and provided the first detailed operational framework for EU Member States. This was followed by transformative developments, including the Treaty of Amsterdam (1999), which elevated gender equality to a fundamental EU objective, and the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (2000), which explicitly prohibited gender-based discrimination. Directive 2006/54/EC consolidated the existing legal framework, bringing together various equal treatment provisions for clarity. However, implementation challenges persisted across Member States. The 2013 and subsequent 2020 Commission evaluations identified persisting critical gaps, particularly around the absence or lack of clarity in the definitions of ‘work of equal value’ and difficulties in their practical application, especially within collective bargaining frameworks. In response to these continuing challenges, the Pay Transparency Directive (Directive (EU) 2023/970) was adopted. This directive requires Member States to support and guide the assessment and comparison of the value of work allowing objective, gender-neutral and bias-free job classifications and pay structures to be established. It requires Member States to ensure employers implement pay structures that ensure equal pay for equal work or work of equal value based on four essential factors: skills, effort, responsibility and working conditions.
Ensuring equal pay for the same work is a well-understood and well-established principle in compensation systems. However, extending this to work of equal value – whereby different jobs with comparable skill, effort, working conditions and responsibility receive equal pay – is not yet widely understood or applied. Indeed, the difficulty in identifying relevant case studies illustrating the implementation of gender-neutral compensation systems to achieve equal pay for work of equal value suggests that these practices remain uncommon.
In the selected case studies, the implementation of the concept of work of equal value was driven by a mixture of motivations: legal compliance (EU and national legislation); the need to modernise outdated pay structures (mainly in collective agreements) and reduce fragmentation of pay setting; internal organisational values in companies; and, in some cases, proactive efforts to address gender pay gaps. However, in many cases, gender neutrality was not the primary motivation but rather a secondary outcome of broader pay structure reforms.
The process of developing gender-neutral compensation systems consists of five key stages: plan, design, implement, monitor and report. Genuine gender neutrality requires deliberate safeguards at each stage, including representative participation, gender equality training, inclusive criteria and regular audits.
Although analytical and criteria-based job evaluation methods are widely deemed more objective and reliable than others, they do not automatically guarantee gender neutrality. Their effectiveness depends on the careful selection and weighting of evaluation criteria, the inclusion of competencies and responsibilities typical of jobs traditionally held by women, and the avoidance of gendered assumptions in both language and process.
Active measures to ensure gender neutrality – such as representative participation, equality training and regular reviews of job descriptions – were present in some cases but often lacking in others. Where proactive approaches were taken, more robust safeguards and corrective actions were implemented.
The implementation of gender-neutral job evaluation systems led to the identification and, in some cases, rectification of unjustified pay gaps, particularly where the process included a focus on female-dominated roles. However, the rectification of collective underpayment was often slow, especially in sectors reliant on public funding or complex and long collective bargaining processes. Company-level initiatives tended to address individual pay gaps more rapidly but often did not extend to structural comparisons between different job categories.
Key challenges to implementation included resistance to the idea or denial of the existence of pay gaps, technical difficulties in job evaluation, subjectivity in scoring and weighting, lack of comprehensive data and (material and financial) resource constraints.
Classifying jobs based on objective criteria is a necessary condition to achieve equal pay for work of equal value, but not sufficient in itself. Objective criteria also need to be chosen and scored through a gender lens, ensuring that factors that are typically more associated with women or men are not valued differently, double-counted or omitted, simply because of that association. The transposition of the Pay Transparency Directive into national law should ensure that this gender lens is taken into account, and that practical, accessible analytical tools and guidelines are provided to support employers and social partners.
At the same time, social partners can become active promoters of this approach and support their members in various ways to meet the Pay Transparency Directive’s requirements. This includes promoting a shared recognition of the issue, providing capacity building and training on the principle of equal pay, and offering practical support to align approaches with proven or agreed standards. Such initiative can help reduce companies’ costs and their reliance on external providers.
The most important lever that social partners have is to ensure that sectoral (or models for company) collective bargaining agreements include up-to-date job classifications that are guaranteed to be gender neutral. Endeavours to reduce the fragmentation in pay setting, thus moving to more encompassing agreements and increasing worker coverage, can support the further reduction of equal-value-driven pay gaps.
Good practices should be collected and assessed. When their effectiveness is established, they should be promoted by governments, equality bodies and social partners. An example of such good practice is formally and directly involving people who represent a good balance of genders, levels and roles in the design, implementation and periodic review of job classification and evaluation schemes, in close collaboration with workers’ representatives. Any updates to EU guidelines by the European Commission – as foreseen in Article 4(3) of the Pay Transparency Directive – will set an important standard in this regard.
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List of tables
Table 1: Classification of criteria used to define work of equal value across Member States
Table 2: Example of the possibility of detecting and explaining pay gaps in pay reporting depending on differences in job classifications
Table 3: Examples of job evaluation guidelines and checklists across Member States
Table 4: Illustrative gendered job title comparisons
Table 5: Factors overlooked in female-dominated jobs and factors emphasised in male-dominated jobs
Table 6: Example of a gendered job evaluation, based on a biased selection of sub-factors
Table 7: Example of gender-neutral job evaluation, where inclusive sub-factors were added
Table 8: Female- and male-dominated jobs of equal value
Table 9: Summary of the five-stage process for the development of gender-neutral compensation systems
Table 10: Overview of selected case studies and comparative assessment on work of equal value and gender neutrality
Table 11: Examples of collective underpayments for groups of workers doing work of equal value
Table 12: Contributors from the Network of Eurofound Correspondents
List of figures
Figure 1: Criteria for establishing the value of work and justifying pay differentials
Figure 2: Legal basis for defining equal work and work of equal value across the EU
Figure 3: Overview of countries with at least one pay transparency instrument that includes work of equal value principles, 2024
Figure 4: The role and influence of collective agreements in advancing pay equity for jobs of equal value
Figure 5: Representation of the compensation management systems
Eurofound recomandă ca această publicație să fie citată după cum urmează.
Eurofound (2025), Equal value, equal pay: Concepts, mechanisms and implementation towards gender pay equity, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg.
