“The Chartered Management Institute recently released new figures released today reveal that the average female executive suffers a lifetime earnings gap of £423,390 when compared to a male worker with an identical career path. With the current gap between male and female average pay at management level standing at £10,060 a year, a woman and a man entering executive roles aged 25 and working their way up the career ladder until retiring aged 60 would take home pre-tax totals of £1,092,940 and £1,516,330 respectively, based on today’s levels.

The figure is based on analysis by the Chartered Management Institute (CMI) of market pay data collected by salary survey specialists XpertHR, which looks at salary and labour turnover data for 38,843 people in executive roles in the UK. The research reveals that the average male in an executive role earned a basic salary of £40,325 over the 12 months to August 2012, compared to £30,265 for a female in the same type of role. Although female junior executives earn marginally more (£363) than males at junior levels for the second year running (£21,491 compared to £21,128), the gender pay gap remains substantial at the opposite end of the executive career ladder, with female directors earning an average basic salary of £127,257 – £14,689 less than the male director average of £141,946.

This year’s survey also reveals that the gender pay gap extends to annual rewards. At the 91 participating employers providing data on the payment of bonuses, women receive less than half what men are awarded in monetary terms – the average bonus for a male executive was £7,496, compared to £3,726 for a female executive. This picture gets worse as women and men progress in their careers with 50% of males at director level receiving bonuses compared to 36% of females. At £65,000, the average bonus paid to a male director was £7,000 more than that awarded to a female director.”