Actualidad Peru

Promoting gender wage equality by classifying job positions

Supporting legislation to Act 30709

According to research conducted by the International Labor Organization in 2016, the wage gap between women and men worldwide is 23%, while information from Peru’s National Civil Service Authority in 2017 puts the gender wage gap in this country at 16% in the public sector and 29% in the private sector.

The Peruvian Republic’s Congress has recently passed Act 30709 on Wage Discrimination between Men and Women, discussed in the previous issue of Progreso, requiring all private-sector employers to establish categories, functions and wage brackets to enable them to put into practice the principle of Equal Pay for Equal Work, consistent with the constitutional mandate of equal opportunities without discrimination in labor relations, as well as the principle of Identical Income for Work of the Same Value provided for in Act 28983 on Opportunities between Women and Men.

In line with the foregoing, this set of secondary legislation for Act 30709 (hereinafter, the Regulation) develops the definitions, criteria and parameters laid out in that law. It also sets the implementation of measures and guidelines to guarantee a working environment based on respect, non-discrimination and achieving a proportionate work/life balance.

The Regulation highlights as the employer’s key obligation that of drawing up tables of categories and function, based on assessing and grouping job positions, applying objective criteria according to: (i) the tasks entailed in each position; (ii) the aptitudes required to carry them out; and (iii) the job profile. In addition, the employer can choose to include wage brackets in their remuneration policies. In order to determine the criteria and make an objective assessment, the employer may apply the methodology and criteria they consider most appropriate provided that these do not involve discrimination, whether direct or indirect, on the basis of gender.

The Regulation also stipulates that, as an exception, workers in the same category may receive different remuneration, when these differences are justified by objective criteria such as seniority, performance, collective bargaining, lack of qualified personnel for a particular position, etc.

It should be pointed out that the employer must inform their workers of the wage or remuneration policy that has been implemented, as well as the criteria for such performance assessments as have an impact on their remuneration, together with any changes made to these policies and/or criteria.

Another of the Regulation’s stipulations that we should highlight is the adoption of such measures as may be necessary to prevent pre- and post-natal and breastfeeding leave-of-work absences or those taken to look after elderly or handicapped people from having a negative impact on decisions to raise wages and/or benefits of any kind; these periods should be calculated as though they have been worked.

In an additional provision, the Regulation adds to the General Work Inspection Law two new types of breach that will be classified as “very serious”: (i) not having a table of categories and functions or a wage policy that conforms to the terms of the law; and (ii) not having complied with the obligation to inform workers about the company’s wage policy.

Private-sector companies will have until September 2018 to implement the table of categories and functions; companies that already have this table will have until 31st December 2018 to adapt it to the criteria laid out in the Act and Regulation.

The National Labor Supervisory Authority (SUNAFIL) will oversee compliance with this regulation from January 1, 2019.