Women in Tech Index

With gender disparity a topic at the forefront of modern discourse, leading technology career platform Honeypot, has released the 2018 Women in Tech Index. The results offer a view on gender-based employment inequalities both at large and in the technology sector. In an effort to position themselves as industry experts, the developer-focused career platform decided to research the role that gender parity plays in the technology landscape by comparing the proportion of female employees, gender wage gap and opportunities for women in the IT field, among other criteria. In sharing the results of this study, Honeypot aims to highlight which countries offer the best opportunities for women in tech and to encourage the industry at large to take further positive steps towards gender parity.

The study focuses on 41 countries in the OECD and EU, and offers comparable data relating to both the tech industry and the wage gap. The data covers areas such as:

• Gender in the Overall Economy: factors such as percentage of women in work and the overall gender income parity.
• Women in Tech: as measured by the number of women in IT positions compared to the overall numbers of people in tech.
• Opportunities for Women in Tech: calculated by comparing the difference between the percentage share of women in the general workforce, and the percentage of women in the technology sector. In addition, the study took into account the percentage of female STEM graduates.
• Tech Wage Gap: difference in gender wage gap between women working in the tech industry and the overall workforce at large.
• Female Career Progression: as judged by the percentage of women in managerial and ministerial positions.

Finally, to bring attention to any potential barriers which might hinder a woman’s progression in the tech industry and to highlight the best opportunities for women, the Gender Inequality Index was analysed. This reviews women’s reproductive health, empowerment and labor market participation to conclude overall parity. To determine if equality has increased or decreased in recent history, we then calculated the difference between the current available wage gap data, as compared to five years previous.

“Gender parity in the workplace is not just an ethical or moral issue, but also an economic one: McKinsey found that $12 trillion could be added to global GDP by 2025 by advancing women’s equality.  As tech recruitment specialists, we are often confronted with the gender imbalances of the industry, which are fully exposed in this study.” says Emma Tracey, Co-Founder at Honeypot. “The results reveal the countries which have the most to offer women looking to progress in the tech industry, with Portugal, The United States and Latvia highlighted as the top three nations that have taken positive steps towards gender parity in the technology field in terms of fairer wages. However, with the proportion of female tech workers remaining under 30% across the board, we hope that this study will enrich the conversation concerning equality in this industry and inspire more women to seek out opportunities in tech.”

Selected data:

• Portugal, The United States and Latvia offer the best opportunities for women in tech, with an industry gender pay gap around 6-7% less than the overall average wage gap in each country.
• The United States offers the highest wages to women working in tech, at $86,608 per annum, followed by Ireland ($60,558) and Switzerland ($59,029).
• At 30%, Bulgaria has the highest percentage of women working in tech, followed by Australia with 28% and Romania at 26%.

Why was this study conducted? - In sharing the results of this study, Honeypot aims to highlight which countries offer the best opportunities for women in tech and to encourage the industry at large to take further positive steps towards gender parity.

What factors account for USA's placement? - The US ranks in 2nd place for the overall ranking. This indicates that the wage gap in the Tech Industry is lower than the wage gap in industry at large in this country. The US is in a group of only 10 countries in this index to 

How can we strengthen the participation of women in tech? Many countries, including the USA, already run many initiatives to engage women in the tech industry. These are a great way to improve engagement.