The International Labour Organisation (ILO) has ranked Pakistan among the worst in South Asia for wage disparities between men and women, confirming long-standing concerns about structural discrimination in the country’s labour market.
The ILO’s latest Global Wage Report states that women in Pakistan earn an average of 34 per cent less than their male counterparts, a pay gap significantly wider than the global average and worse than in other countries in the region, including India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal. While some countries have shown gradual improvement in narrowing the divide, Pakistan has made no progress with its deeply embedded socio-economic, cultural, and institutional factors continuing to drive the disparity.
A significant portion of female employment in Pakistan is concentrated in the low-wage informal economy that includes agricultural labour, domestic work and home-based manufacturing, with limited protections and virtually no access to formal contracts or benefits. The World Economic Forum’s 2025 Global Gender Gap Report has also placed Pakistan at 151st out of 156 countries, ahead of only a handful of nations in terms of economic participation and opportunity for women.
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