동일가치노동 동일임금의 판단기준

The legal provision for equal pay for equal value work was stipulated in the former Equal Employment Opportunity And Work-family Balance Assistance Act in 1989. However, it is so hard to find cases of it that it can be said as non-performing and not valid. This study aims to establish legal theory of equal pay for equal value work in Korean labor law and to put forth major issues and improvement measures to establish specific criteria for equal pay for equal value work that can be utilized in the remedy procedures of wage discrimination. Even if there is equal pay for equal value work, if salary cap is set up high for jobs where male workers dominate and low for jobs where female do, it can be construed that there is gender discrimination. But with regard to this, the excuse that “discriminatory practices of the past when women’s employment was made later than men’s and there were jobs mostly covered by male employees had a tendency of setting up a high cap” can be granted. Or, as in the Wilson case in the UK, where the seniority wage system is argued as discrimination against women when men and women perform same jobs, the practices of seniority-based salary failed to justify this. Contrary to some claims that Korea's seniority-based salary system and legal provisions for equal pay for value work are incompatible, the seniority-based salary system that is not contaminated with discrimination and thus well in place can work under the provisions for equal pay for equal value work and the anti-discrimination law. But citing the seniority-based wage practice as if it were a panacea can compromises the legislative purpose of equal pay for equal value work, we need a more nuanced approach than framing the. This is because in countries like the US where only the “genuine seniority-based wage structure” is provided, such justification can be accepted in most cases. The basic principle should be that the argument presented for seniority-based wages has to be able to break the presumption that there has been gender discrimination in wages (a violation of the provision for equal pay for equal value work). In cases where there is a wage difference between men and women in same jobs because of the seniority wage system working more favorably for men, the wage system should be strictly examined for justification. Only with justifiable reasons, the case that different seniority wage systems for equal value work can be granted and accepted. In particular, if evidence shows that different seniority standards for same value jobs are derived of gender discrimination, employers’ defense should be reviewed more strictly.