74% of people believe medium and large employers should assess and disclose their pay gaps, a survey conducted by STILLMindingTheGap.nz has found.
However, many businesses were lagging, with 40% having never examined their gender pay gaps.
The platform reported that although 95% of organisations already possessed the data required for pay gap reporting, only 43% had current pay gap calculations.
“I don’t think I’ve seen a policy that has more universal support, if you include those who are neutral 84% of us are expecting that medium and large employers will be required to publish their pay gaps,” organisation spokesperson Dr Jo Cribb said.
“Not surprisingly, women are more concerned than men, but interestingly, if you dig into the detail, for some reason Aucklanders are really keen, and, again, not surprisingly, younger workers are too.”
STILLMindingTheGap.nz introduced a member’s bill that would require businesses with over 150 employees to report their gender pay gap. Cribb said the bill will receive its first reading if it gains the support of 61 MPs.
“There’s a huge groundswell out there for pay gap reporting so that we know what our employers pay gaps are, we can make decisions, we can choose whether we buy from them, and we can choose whether we work with them,” she added.
“Also, publishing the pay gaps has been done internationally, all of the EU nation states, 50% of the OECD have required medium to large businesses to publish their pay gaps and the gender pay gap as a result has dropped by 20 to 40%, so who wouldn’t want that.”
In 2025, the overall gender pay gap was 5.2% but it was higher for certain ethnic groups—12% for wāhine Māori, nearly 16%for Pacific women, and around 10% for Asian women.
STILLMindingTheGap.nz reported that the media, finance, and professional services sectors each had the poorest records, with a 15% pay gap.
The female-dominated healthcare and education sectors had pay gaps of 14% and 13% respectively.
The male-dominated wholesale industry also showed a 14% gap.