How employees perceive the gender pay gap and pay equity according to Omni Calculator
This is a contributed post on third-party research from Omni Calculator.
Gender inequality at work shows up in many forms: who gets promoted, who's taken seriously in a meeting, who carries the caregiving load at home and pays for it at the office, who's represented in leadership, and who isn't. Most forms of inequality are hard to measure and harder to fix. Pay is different. It's a number, and the gender pay gap is a calculation organizations can and should monitor.
Yet according to a new Omni Calculator survey of 808 employees and 403 founders, CEOs, and C-suite executives, many employers aren't checking. 49% of employers conduct no pay equity review. Among those that do, only 16% have ever adjusted anyone's pay after finding a gap, while 30% found a discrepancy and made no change.
It's no wonder, then, that employees often misunderstand the gender pay gap and what to do when they feel unfairly paid.
Executives and employees see this differently from the start. In our survey, 73% of executives said they believe men and women are paid equitably at their organization, compared with 50% of employees. Our survey asked about broad belief, not a controlled analysis, so these figures should be read as a measure of perception, not a finding about pay discrimination at any specific company.
Differences employees see that HR may miss
From our survey, we found that men are more than four times as likely as women to say they don't believe a gender pay gap exists, at 18% versus 4%. When asked about their own pay, 27% of women say they personally earn less than a male colleague doing the same job, compared with 3% of men.
Some pay gaps are also harder to see in a conventional compensation review. A 2026 study published in Research in Social Stratification and Mobility on occupational devaluation found that when an identical occupation was described as female-dominated, respondents recommended lower pay for it than when it was described as mixed or male-dominated. In our survey, 46% of employees and 41% of executives correctly identified that pay tends to decrease as a field becomes more female. Women were more likely than men to recognize this, at 51% versus 34%. It shows that pay equity isn't always just about comparing two people doing the same job. Sometimes the question is how the work itself is valued.
Leaders also expect different things than employees do when it comes to how people say they would respond to a pay gap. Executives expected 21% of employees to report a gender pay gap formally, but only 14% of employees said they would. Just 8% of executives thought employees would do nothing, compared with 14% of employees. Executives also underestimated how many would simply ask for a raise: they predicted 29%, compared with 35% of employees who said they would. This means one third of employees prefer to ask for a raise to close the gap rather than point it out.
Those responses represent different ways employees may try to address a perceived pay gap. But around 1 in 4 employees would not take a direct step at all. Among employees who said they would do nothing, 51% said they didn't think speaking up would change anything. Another 32% weren't sure the difference was actually unfair and thought there might be a legitimate explanation. As a result, an employee unhappy with their pay may look for another job rather than bring it up with their manager.
AI is potentially widening pay inequity
AI adds another layer to the pay equity question, as access to AI-related work is already uneven. New LinkedIn research found that women accounted for just 26% of U.S. hires into AI roles in 2025, compared with 50% of hires into non-AI occupations. Women also hold only 13% of C-suite AI leadership roles across the 27 countries included in the research. Research from BCG on reinventing the CHRO role in an AI-driven enterprise points to a related shift: as AI becomes embedded in workforce decisions, HR's responsibility for overseeing those systems is growing.
That imbalance matters when companies start using AI to make or support workplace decisions. Our survey found that 33% of executives are optimistic that AI will help close the gender pay gap, compared with just 11% of employees. Meanwhile, 17% of employers believe AI-driven changes are likely to reduce women's access to higher-paying roles at their own company. We didn't ask employees the same question, so the figures can't be directly compared, but alongside LinkedIn's hiring data, the question becomes who is responsible for developing and adopting AI systems, and who is checking what they produce.
There are also reasons to be cautious about assuming AI systems are neutral in employment decisions. Another 2026 study examining how large language models make hiring decisions found that, for the same résumé, models were more likely to rate female candidates as qualified but still recommended lower pay than for male candidates. The finding does not establish that AI is causing gender pay gaps in workplaces, but it highlights HR's important role in choosing AI tools and the processes used to implement them.
What HR can do
Make remediation a regular and proactive part of compensation management. A pay equity review shouldn't end when HR identifies a discrepancy. Organizations should have a clear process for investigating potential disparities, deciding whether an adjustment is needed, and determining how to remediate the situation. In our survey, only 16% of employers that had conducted a pay equity review said they had ever adjusted someone's pay after finding a gap, while 30% said they had found a discrepancy but made no change.
Look beyond formal complaints. Employees don't always report pay concerns formally. They may ask for a raise or decide that speaking up isn't worth the risk. More than half of employees who said they would do nothing about a pay gap, 51%, said they wouldn't speak up because they didn't think it would change anything. HR should pay attention to quieter signals through employee surveys, manager feedback, and turnover.
Give employees more transparency in pay decisions. In our survey, nearly half of American employers (49%) said they share no salary ranges at all, either internally or publicly. Pay transparency requirements vary significantly by state and country, so specific disclosure practices should be evaluated against applicable law. Yet 82% of women and 74% of men said greater transparency would help close the gender pay gap. Executives were less convinced: 23% said transparency would not help, compared with 11% of employees. Publishing salary ranges and communicating the data behind pay decisions won't solve every pay disparity, but employees are more likely to feel that their pay is fair when they can see the work that goes into it.
The bottom line
Pay remains one of the more measurable forms of gender inequality at work. An organization can examine salaries, compare like-for-like roles, and track what happens after it finds a disparity. The harder part is building equitable pay structures and job architecture with defined compensable factors to run complex pay equity analysis aligned with legal and finance.
That's why perception matters. As pay transparency laws expand and AI becomes a risk for propagating bias, the gap between what leadership believes and what employees experience will only matter more. HR needs a compensation strategy rooted in defensible pay ranges with ongoing pay equity analysis.
About the author:
Reyhaneh Mansouri is a research writer at Omni Calculator, specializing in original research on workplace, technology, and social trends. Her previous research has explored HR, the future of work, and careers, with a focus on understanding how changing workplaces and technologies affect employees and organizations.
