Women and the UK economy

Women in employment

In the UK, 16.37 million women aged 16 and over were in employment in October to December 2024, according to the ONS UK Labour Force Survey. This means that 195,000 more women were employed than in the year before. The female employment rate was 71.8% and the male employment rate was 78.2%.

There were 10.42 million women working full time, while 5.96 million were working part time. 36% of women in employment worked part-time, compared with 14% of men.

In the UK, the sectors with the most women in employment were health and social work (accounting for 22% of all jobs held by women as of September 2024), education (12%) and the wholesale and retail trade (12%). 77% of the jobs in the health and social work sector and 70% of the jobs in education are held by women.

How much are women paid?

Median weekly pay for female full-time employees was £672 in April 2024, according to data from the ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings. This compared with £773 for male full-time employees.

After adjusting for inflation, median pay for women working full time was around 2% higher than its level during the economic downturn in 2008, while median pay for men was around 7% lower.

In April 2024, the gender pay gap in median hourly pay (excluding overtime) between men and women was:

• 7.0% for full-time employees
• -3.0% for part-time employees (median hourly pay was higher for women)
• 13.1% for all employees

The gender pay gap for all employees is larger than either the full-time or part-time pay gaps. This is because more women than men are employed part time and part-time workers tend to earn less per hour than those working full time.

How many businesses are run by women?

Of the UK’s small and medium-sized enterprises with employees, 15% were led by women in 2023, according to data from the Government’s annual Small Business Survey.

Around 10% of working-age women in the UK economy were early-stage entrepreneurs in 2023, compared to around 12% of men, according to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitoring survey. This means that close to half of entrepreneurs in the UK were women (46%), up from around 1 in 3 in 2018/19.

In January 2025, 42.8% of FTSE100 and 42.6% of FTSE350 directorships were occupied by women. Just over half of all new FSTSE100 board appointments were women (53%).