Chile: Parliament adopts the Equal Pay Act

Objective criteria to justify the pay gap. “Employers will have to respect the principle of equal remuneration between men and women performing the same job. Criteria such as aptitude, quality, responsibilities and productivity will not be considered as arbitrary” the new law reads. In other words, gender pay gaps will still be allowed, provided that they are based on criteria other than gender. Besides, the Chilean senators added the obligation for businesses with over 200 workers to draw a personnel register describing the hierarchal rank and tasks performed by every employee to facilitate controls. To encourage the application of this law, businesses which remove all gender pay gaps will see fines for their other violations of the labor code reduced of 10%. Both the Observatory for Gender Equality (Observatorio de Género y Equidad) and the National Women’s Service (Servicio Nacional de la Mujer) promised to monitor the enforcement of the new law.
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orkers suffering from discrimination – usually women – can press charges against their employers. Businesses breaking the law incur fines going from 36.000 to 2 million Chilean pesos (€48.000-2.6 million) depending on the size of the company. In average, in Chile, women receive about 22% less than their male colleagues. In 2000, it was 31%.

Objective criteria to justify the pay gap. “Employers will have to respect the principle of equal remuneration between men and women performing the same job.

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