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Women at all levels of education in Turkey have lower wages than their male counterparts, with the pay gap being the largest among university graduates, the Stockholm Center for Freedom reported, citing Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) data.
The official statistics were based on data from 2022, and the pay gap was presented as a percentage of average male income before tax for each educational segment.
The gap was 12.4 percent among people with an elementary school education or less; 12.8 percent among people with a secondary education; 16 percent among high school graduates; and 17.1 percent among people with an advanced degree.
The employment rates also varied between the genders, particularly in young adults aged 25 to 49 with an infant below the age of 3, where only 28 percent of women were in the workforce compared to 90.5 percent of men.
Female employment rates were lowest in Kurdish-majority southeastern provinces such as Mardin, Batman, Şırnak and Siirt.
Women’s involvement in the job market increased in parallel with their level of education, with an employment rate of 68.8 percent among university graduates compared to 27.1 percent among those without a high school diploma and 13.9 among people with only an elementary school or no education.
As of the end of 2023, 119 out of 599 members of parliament were women. The percentage of women increased among professors employed in higher education from 27.6 percent in the 2010-2011 academic year to 33.9 percent in 2022-2023. From 2012 to 2022, the proportion of women among high-ranking corporate executives rose from 14.4 percent to 19.6 percent.
Women had a life expectancy of 80.3 years between 2020 and 2022, higher than men’s 74.8 years.