New EU rules on pay transparency explained

Have you been applying for jobs and felt frustrated not knowing what the pay was? Have you gone through several rounds of interviews, completed tests, prepared documents, and invested significant time and energy, only to find out at the end that the salary was far below your expectations? Or realised after years of working in your role that your colleague is receiving a higher salary for the same work? The EU is changing that!

New EU pay transparency rules are now taking effect across the EU. They will increase pay transparency, strengthen enforcement of the principle of equal pay between women and men, and improve access to justice for victims of pay discrimination. 

In practice, this means employers will have to

• inform job seekers about the starting salary or pay range in the vacancy notice or ahead of the interview, and no longer be allowed to ask them about their pay history
• provide employees, on request, with information on their individual pay level and the average pay levels, broken down by sex, for categories of workers doing the same work or work of equal value
• publish information on the pay gap between female and male workers (employers with at least 100 employees)
• carry out a pay assessment if pay reports reveal a gender pay gap of at least 5% that cannot be justified 

The new rules also improve access to justice for victims of pay discrimination

• workers who have suffered gender pay discrimination can receive compensation
• employers that do not meet transparency obligations will need to prove that there was no pay discrimination
• EU countries should set penalties for breaking the equal pay rule
• equality bodies and workers' representatives can represent workers in legal or administrative proceedings 

The right to equal pay between women and men for equal work or work of equal value has been a founding principle of the European Union since the Treaty of Rome in 1957. Currently, the gender pay gap in the EU stands at 11.1%. To help close this gap and advance gender equality, the Commission proposed the Directive on pay transparency, which was adopted in 2023.

For more information

Commission welcomes the political agreement on new EU rules for pay transparency

EU action for equal pay

Share this article: