Like many countries worldwide, gender pay inequity is a persistent issue in Germany. Recent analyses show that women in Germany earn 18 percent less on average than their male counterparts – the third highest pay gap in the EU. 

In 2017, Germany adopted the Wage Transparency Law (Entgelttransparenzgesetz) to try and address this problem.

The act is designed to highlight pay discrepancies between male and female employees who do equal work. In fact, it’s designed as way to get around the non-disclosure clauses in some employment contracts and the general taboo in German society when it comes to discussing salaries, both of which makes it difficult for women to know if they are being underpaid. 

Unfortunately, making use of the law in practice can prove quite complicated – but it can be done. So if you suspect your male colleagues might be taking home a bigger salary for no good reason, here’s how to find out. 

How does it all work? 

The law, which came into effect in July 2017, has two main stipulations aimed to make pay disparities more transparent and encourage companies to address them. 

First, it enables individuals working at companies with more than 200 people to know the median pay of a group of at least six employees of the opposite sex who work at the same level as you. 

Second, the law encourages companies with more than 500 employees to regularly review their pay structures and publish details on whether they are complying with equal pay rules as part of their financial reports.

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OK, but how do you get hold of this information? 

If you work at a company that employs 200 people, and has at least six people of the opposite sex doing comparable work to you, you can submit a written request for pay information. In this request, you have to demonstrate that the employees whose pay information you are requesting are doing equivalent work to you. This generally means they have the same overall requirements and burdens as you. A good benchmark would be if that person can stand in for you if you miss work because of illness or vacation. 

You can formulate the request on your own, or use a form provided by the government. You should submit the request through your workers’ council (Betriebsrat) unless your company doesn’t have one, in which case, you can go directly through your employer. 

In addition to requesting information on the median of the average full-time annual salary for your position (with the median being the halfway between the lowest and highest salaries), you can request information on up to two other salary components, such as performance-related pay and hardship allowances. Your employer is also required to tell you how they determined your own remuneration.  

Within three months the works council is expected to collect the requested information from the employer and return it to you in written form. You are only allowed to make a request once every two years, but if you team up with other colleagues, you can get access to much more info in a shorter period of time. 

READ ALSO: Women in Germany earn nearly a fifth less than men

What do I do with this information?

Depending on what you find out, there are multiple next steps. If you discover that you earn less than the median salary of your peers, this doesn’t automatically give you the right to a salary adjustment. Instead, a good first step is to take your concerns to your works council or trade union, who should then relay them to the company and pressure your employers to review their pay structure.

If you really want to ramp things up, suing for equal pay under the General Equal Treatment Act (Allgemeines Gleichbehandlungsgesetzes) is also an option – though this route can be precarious. If you’re in a union, you might want to consult with them for legal advice about whether your case is likely to succeed. 

This is because you would have to prove that you are being paid less because of your gender. And while the legal process can be long (a recent successful lawsuit took more than four years), you have to decide quickly if you want to pursue it: after finding out about the salary discrepancies, you have just two months to file a claim. 

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What if my company doesn’t qualify? 

A main critique of the Wage Transparency Law is that a majority of women in the country don’t qualify for it, given that around two-thirds of women work in small businesses that employ less than 200 people.

For this reason, critics have called for a reform to the law so that it applies to all companies. Some politicians have embraced this position, with Green Party leader Ricarda Lang hopeful that a change could come as early as this year.

Until that point, strategies for increasing pay transparency at smaller companies include talking openly with fellow employees about salaries and collaborating with your works council to pressure your company to reveal – and potentially review – its pay structures.

Another option is to search for information on average salaries in your field at companies similar to yours, or use websites like Glassdoor to check for salary information from your company.

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Is this law actually effective? 

All in all, making use of the transparency law can be pretty daunting. Even if an employee uses the law to reveal pay discrepancies, there is no guarantee that the company will address the gap. Indeed, critics have argued that the law unfairly places the burden on employees to act on pay discrepancies, through lawsuits or other pressure tactics, rather than companies. 

Perhaps for these reasons, the law has had an underwhelming effect, as it appears that a vast majority of employees haven’t taken advantage of it since its implementation. According to an evaluation from 2019, only four percent of employees surveyed had submitted a request for information, while about 45 percent of companies with over 500 employees have reviewed their pay structures.

Germany is not unique in its rocky rollout of its pay transparency law, as a report by Eurofund found that other countries who adopted pay transparency laws in response to the European Commission’s recommendations have also faced challenges in implementation. But the report contends that with continued dedication to the issue of equal pay, and a willingness to adjust and reform laws seeking to address this issue, these measures could prove more effective with time.