New Scientist - USA (2022-04-09)

9 April 2022 | New Scientist | 11

STEM pay gaps worsen

Despite the economic impact of the pandemic, STEM salaries are on the rise – but not for everyone

Salary is one of the first questions on people’s lips

when considering a potential employer or job, and

for STEM it is no different. What are pay prospects

like for the industry? How might salary trends be

changing? And are there disparities that employers

could address to attract and retain employees, and

help make the industry more fulfilling for everyone?

These were key questions in the 2022 New

Scientist Jobs Global Employment Report in

association with science recruitment specialists

SRG. This year, the number of respondents reached

a record high of more than 4300 people currently

working in STEM in the UK, the rest of Europe and

the US. In the 2021 survey, covid-19 played a

significant role in shaping many aspects of work.

Now, more than two years on from the pandemic’s

onset, employment in STEM seems to have adapted

well on the whole, with salaries by region and sector

holding up well.

The average annual salary of respondents

in the UK was £45,935 – the highest since the

survey began – with the majority earning between

£20,000 and £29,000 and 6 per cent earning

above £100,000. The highest-paid areas were

East Anglia, the south-east and Greater London,

which have all consistently been top spots for salary.

For the rest of Europe, the average wage came to

€52,972. This figure is always bumped up by the

disproportionately high salaries of those answering

from Switzerland, home to the respondents with

the highest wages in this region. However, it is still

lower than the UK’s currency equivalent. In the US,

the average salary was $80,156, the only region

of the three to see a decrease in earnings. But a

substantial 16 per cent of US respondents were

earning more than $150,000, with Virginia being

the highest-earning state.

Looking to individual sectors, in the UK, engineers

earned the most of all those surveyed. They had an

average wage of £57,881, more than 25 per cent

above the average, which is in agreement with other

surveys on pay for the sector. Medical technology,

pharmaceuticals and biotechnology also emerged

as lucrative UK sectors. At the other end of the scale,

clinical and laboratory work had the lowest salary

prospects, with earnings falling 23 per cent below the

average. In Europe, those in pharmaceuticals had the

highest wage overall, in stark contrast to academia,

which paid a staggering 32 per cent below the

average. Similarly, in the US, the engineering

and pharmaceutical sectors came out on top.

Inequalities worsen

Overall, the findings reflect a broadly positive picture

for STEM salaries, which seem to be increasing

across the regions surveyed. This is reassuring given

the economic effects of covid-19, as well as the

rising demand for STEM graduates and skills in many

countries. But when it comes to salary differences

between groups, the results are less savoury.

One key finding of the survey was that the gender

pay gap within STEM has significantly widened this

year across all regions. It has jumped from 19.4 per

cent to almost 28 per cent in the UK; from 7 per cent

to 17 per cent in Europe; and from 12 per cent to

17.5 per cent in the US. In the UK, this gap amounts to

men earning £6000 above the average and women

earning £6600 below, a pay gap increase that is

mirrored in the nation overall, albeit not as drastically.

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It seems that the pandemic has contributed to

this concerning trend. The age groups most likely

to be parents of young children had some of the

largest gender pay gaps in the survey, suggesting

that women may have been taking on more of the

increased childcare commitments while schools

and nurseries were disrupted by covid-19.

Changes to working, such as working from

home and furlough, may also have aggravated

women’s existing under-representation in more

senior or highly paid roles so that women’s

earnings have taken a bigger hit than men’s.

And it isn’t just women’s salaries that are

suffering. The survey also revealed that salaries

of minority ethnicity groups in the UK were falling

short too, with only white respondents earning

above the average salary of £45,935. In general,

this was linked to job levels – 30 per cent of

white respondents held senior positions in their

organisation, for example, compared with only

10 per cent of Black respondents, of whom

there were none at the highest executive level.

Despite generally good salaries across the

industry, then, critical pay gaps remain and are

worsening. Actions such as funding schemes to

help people return to work, ensuring fair recruitment

and changing workplace culture will help to improve

pay prospects for marginalised groups and tackle

some of the inequalities that are still rife in all

industries, including STEM. Salary will always be a

hot topic – but it should be for all the right reasons.

Gege Li is a freelance writer based in London.

Download the full salary survey at

newscientist.com/globalemploymentreport

In association with

£51,

£39,

Average current STEM salary

UK

£45 ,

EUROPE

€52,

US

$80,

€47,

€56,

$86,

$72,

Men

Women

Women

Men

Women

Men

Based on a survey of UK, Europe and US respondents