The gender equality index was published on Monday by the Ministry of Labor, which coincides with International Women's Day.

And good news: equal pay is progressing by one point, if we consider all the French companies with more than 50 employees.

But only 2% of companies reach the maximum score of 100/100.

Professional equality is progressing slowly in companies: this is what appears on reading the results of the gender equality index published Monday morning by the Ministry of Labor.

The overall score, all companies combined, was 85 points out of 100 in 2020 (compared to 84 points in 2019) *.

But only 2% of companies reach the maximum score of 100/100, which leads the Ministry of Labor to consider that 98% of companies can do better.

"We will be in zero tolerance with targeted controls," said Minister Elisabeth Borne in

Le Figaro on

Monday.

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13% of companies do not comply with the law on wage increases after maternity leave

Analysis of the index detail reveals that two elements are still lagging behind in France.

First, the insufficient respect of the obligation to increase the wages of women returning from maternity leave (while the law requires since 2006 that they be increased to the minimum of the average of the increases granted during their absence. to employees belonging to the same category).

In 2020, 13% of companies did not comply with this obligation.

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Decline in the share of women in the 10 highest paid companies

Second point of vigilance: the low presence of women among the 10 highest paid companies.

Only a quarter of companies respect parity in their 10 highest salaries, and, among companies with more than 1,000 employees, 43% have fewer than two women in their top 10, which reflects a decline compared to 2019 when the proportion was 37%!

As a reminder, all companies with more than 50 employees must publish their global index each year on March 1.

Those whose score is less than 75/100 have three years to correct the situation, under penalty, at the end of the three years, of financial penalties of up to 1% of the payroll.

As the index was implemented in 2019, the first financial sanctions will be imposed as of March 1, 2022.

* The rating of Europe 1 for the 2020 financial year is 90/100.