Latest study: It will take 200 years to achieve gender equality among construction workers

Just one in eight construction workers are female, which significantly is the lowest share of any industrial group and at the current rate of growth the number of women in the construction industry will not equal men until 2194.

The survey shoes that although there are an estimated 60,972 more women in the construction industry now than there were in 2009, as a proportion of the overall workforce, women increased by just 2.1%, from 10.4% in 2009 to 12.5% in 2018.

Jude Brimble, GMB’s national secretary, said of the findings: “Our analysis is a sobering reminder of the scale of the challenge facing the industry. As a union we are committed to advancing the cause of gender equality in all industries.”

The survey results are certainly not going to be too much of a surprise for anyone within the industry as clearly the construction industry in the UK has always been male-dominated.

The simple truth is that if we have any hope of overcoming the massive skills shortage the UK construction industry is facing it’s crucial that we succeed in encouraging more women to choose a career in construction.

If more women are going to choose a job in construction things will have to change, starting with the gender pay gap, if the UK has any hope of women seeing construction as an attractive career option.

There are however signs of improvement, the 20th RICS and Macdonald & Company Rewards and Attitudes survey found that the gender pay gap has not only closed in the construction sector during the past year to 20.43%, down from last year’s 36%, but that the construction industry was one of the poorest for pay disparity.