BREAKING THE SILENCE OF PAY: TRANSPARENCY AS EVIDENCE IN GENDER-BASED WAGE DISCRIMINATION

Abstract

The gender pay gap represents one of the most persistent and deeply rooted forms of structural inequality in the labour market of the Republic of Serbia. Despite formal legal guarantees of the right to equal pay for equal work or work of equal value, available data from the Statistical Office of the Republic of Serbia confirm that women earn on average around 13% less than men, have a lower employment rate, and are disproportionately concentrated in sectors with lower average wages, such as education, healthcare, and trade. This gap persists across all levels of education and is further reinforced by pronounced occupational segregation along gender lines. One of the key factors contributing to the persistence of the gender pay gap is the lack of pay transparency. In practice, employers rarely disclose salary amounts or ranges in job advertisements, the criteria for determining pay are often opaque, and employees do not have access to information on wage structures within organizations. Such practices facilitate both the emergence and concealment of discriminatory pay differences, as employees are unable to determine whether they are being paid equally compared to colleagues performing the same or comparable work. From the perspective of the legal framework, the regulations of the Republic of Serbia, primarily the Labour Law, the Anti-Discrimination Law, and the Gender Equality Law, formally guarantee the principle of equal pay and prohibit gender-based discrimination in all aspects of working conditions. However, the concepts of “pay” and “pay transparency” are not precisely defined, which complicates the practical application of these principles and reduces their evidentiary value in judicial and administrative proceedings. From an institutional standpoint, the Commissioner for the Protection of Equality, the Labour Inspectorate, and the Ministry of Labour, Employment, Veteran and Social Affairs are competent to prevent and sanction discrimination in the field of employment. However, the issue of the gender pay gap still does not occupy a sufficiently prominent place within their activities. The absence of a recorded increase in the number of judicial or administrative proceedings concerning the protection of the right to equal pay over the past three years indicates systemic deficiencies in protection mechanisms, which may also be attributed to insufficient awareness among employed women and fear of potential workplace repercussions. From the perspective of evidentiary law, pay transparency has particular procedural significance. Data on wage structures, job evaluation systems, criteria for determining pay, and statistical differences in earnings between men and women may constitute key indicators in establishing the existence of discrimination. In line with contemporary standards of anti-discrimination law, once an employee renders unequal treatment plausible, the burden of proof shifts to the employer, who must demonstrate that the difference in pay is based on objective and gender-neutral factors. In this procedural context, pay transparency acquires additional evidentiary significance, as it provides the factual basis necessary to establish a presumption of discrimination. The gradual alignment of domestic law with European Union standards, in particular Directive 2006/54/EC and Directive 2023/970 on strengthening the application of the principle of equal pay through pay transparency and enforcement mechanisms, represents a key normative framework for improving legal protection in the Republic of Serbia. As a candidate country, the Republic of Serbia is committed to progressively aligning its legislation and institutional practice with European standards, which includes introducing precise definitions of relevant concepts, strengthening obligations related to pay transparency, expanding employees’ rights to access wage information, and extending limitation periods for filing claims to at least three years.

It can be concluded that improving pay transparency within the legal system of the Republic of Serbia is not only a matter of social and economic policy, but also an important procedural instrument in judicial proceedings for protection against discrimination. By developing clearer rules on access to wage information, strengthening institutional capacities, and aligning with European standards, the conditions are created for more effective proof of violations of the right to equal pay and for providing stronger judicial protection to employees.