Women earned on average 16.4 percent less than men in EU nations in 2013, with the gap even greater in many northern nations, the EU statistics agency Eurostat said on Thursday.
Estonia saw the biggest salary gap with 29.9 percent, followed by Austria with 23 percent, the Czech Republic with 22.1 percent and Germany with 21.6 percent.
Britain saw a 19.7 percent difference, France 15.2 percent and Ireland 14.4 percent.
The gap was narrowest in Slovenia with 3.2 percent, followed by Malta with 5.1 percent, Poland with 6.4 percent, Italy with 7.3 percent and Croatia with 7.4 percent.
The salary gap between women and men narrowed from 2008 to 2013 in most of the 28 EU nations, with the biggest decline in Lithuania, from 21.6 percent to 13.3 percent.
Poland, the Czech Republic and Malta also saw big declines. However, the gap increased slightly in nine of the member states, led by Portugal, which rose from 9.2 percent to 13 percent.
Overall, the gap narrowed from 17.3 percent in 2008 to 16.4 percent in 2013.
Eurostat, which published the figures ahead of International Women’s Day on Sunday, said the gap between women and men is not just in pay.
Two-thirds of the directors, executives and managers are men, while two-thirds of office workers are women.
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