Job Evaluation and Equal Pay for Work of Equal Value

Abstract

In July 1982 the European Court of Justice ruled that the United Kingdom's Equal Pay Act infringes Directive 75/117 of the European Economic Community, which provides for equal pay for men and women where the same work, or work of an equal value is being performed. The ruling of the European Court has necessitated changes to the Equal Pay Act in order to give effect to the principle of “equal value” and attention has focused, therefore, on how to give the concept practical expression. To date, the most commonly used method of measuring value is job evaluation, which is said to measure the demands a job makes on a worker. This raises the question as to whether a job evaluation scheme in itself, is an effective instrument for ensuring equality of treatment in assessing the value of men's and women's jobs.

Citation

McNally, J. and Shimmin, S. (1984), "Job Evaluation and Equal Pay for Work of Equal Value", Personnel Review, Vol. 13 No. 1, pp. 27-31. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb055492