Biggest ever recorded jump in weekly earnings as median NZ wages rise

Unemployment rates in New Zealand and several other post-industrial economies are low at the moment. Photo / AP

A key measure of Kiwi wages and salaries has shot up by its largest margin since records started 24 years ago.

Stats NZ data released today showed median weekly earnings from wages and salaries rose 8.8 per cent in the year to June 30.

Despite the big increase, a trade union confederation said women were still suffering from a major pay gap.

According to the income survey, median earnings were now $1189.

Women's median weekly earnings increased by $95 to $1055. As with the overall jump, that increase was the highest for women since the data series started in 1998.

The big rise in median weekly earnings for women coincided with more women working fulltime and fewer part-time, labour market manager Malak Shafik said.

Self-employed people had stagnant incomes, according to today's Stats NZ release.

In the year to the June 30, median weekly income from all sources increased by $78, or 10.1 per cent.

Median income from wages and salaries increased by $96, or 8.8 per cent.

Income from government transfers increased by $31m, or 8.3 per cent.

But income for the self-employed was flat at $767 a week.

The new wage and income data comes at a time of high inflation and low unemployment.

The median wage increase is even greater than a major recent inflation indicator.

The Stats NZ quarterly Consumer Price Index for the three months to June 30 rose 7.3 per cent.

That was the highest CPI increase since 1990.

Last week, another Stats NZ data release found food prices overall were 7.4 per cent higher last month than in July 2021.

And after reaching a record low for the modern era (post-1985) at 3.2 per cent, the unemployment rate rose only slightly to 3.3 per cent in stats released earlier this month.

The Council of Trade Unions said nowhere near enough progress had been made closing the gender pay gap.

Last year the CTU said women started working effectively for free on 22 November 2021, if their lower incomes were compared to what men earned annually.

The CTU said this year the data showed that day only moved to November 23.

"The overall gender pay gap has stubbornly persisted across the past decade," the CTU said today.

"I am not sure that one day's worth of pay gap closure can be described as progress," NZCTU national secretary Melissa Ansell-Bridges said.

"It's frankly disappointing and underlines the need for more urgent effort from companies and the Government on this issue."

The CTU said pay gaps by ethnicity were also persistent.

"The gap for Pasifika women means that in comparison to European men they start working for free on 3 October."

Māori women and Asian women were also still experiencing pay gaps, the CTU said.

"Unemployment is low, yet women of all ethnicities aren't benefitting from the demand for labour," Ansell-Bridges said.

"All employers should make sure that equal work is paid equally."

She called for greater pay transparency urgently, and said companies must be required to report pay gaps publicly and job adverts should state the rate of pay by law.