thebuzby Sarzah Fister Gale
REALITY
CHECK
IN THESE PAGES
16 Return Business
18 The In Crowd
20 The New Carbon
DECADES HAVE PASSED since
the United States and the United
Kingdom enacted laws requiring
equal pay for women. Yet questions
linger over how things play out in
the real world. The IT industry is
no exception. It would seem fair
to assume a progressive field driven
by innovation would have an
equally progressive attitude about
fair wages. Yet some studies show
that women—still a relatively rare
commodity in IT—are trapped in
low-level positions and continue to
bring home less than men.
Only about one-third of 330 U.K.
female tech professionals said their
pay reflects their experience and
skills, according to the Perceptions of
Equal Pay Report 2008, released by
U.K. IT group Intellect last October.
In the United Kingdom, the problem begins early in school. Despite
statistics that show female students
outperform their male counterparts in
science and technology courses, the
number of girls pursuing IT-related
education tracks is much lower than
boys, according to the Women in IT
Scorecard. The report was published
in March by Intellect and two other
U.K. IT groups: the British Computer
Society and e-skills UK. >>
Submit news to pmnetwork@imaginepub.com. All monetary figures are in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted.
ILLUSTRATION BY KEITH NEGLEY
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