Sweden: Implementation of the EU Pay Transparency Directive

On hiring

Provision of information to applicants

Employers must provide information to job applicants about:

• the initial salary or its range;
• (where applicable) the relevant salary provisions in the collective bargaining agreement applied by the employer.

Such information must be provided in reasonable time to allow for an informed and transparent salary negotiation.

This rule does not currently exist under Swedish law and new legislation is therefore required to transpose the requirement into the law.

Prohibition of certain questions

Employers may not ask applicants about their pay history during their current or previous employment relationships.

This rule does not currently exist under Swedish law and new legislation is therefore required to transpose the requirement into the law.

During employment

General pay determination criteria

Employer must make easily accessible the objective, gender-neutral criteria used to determine pay, pay levels and pay progression.

The Directive allows for Member States to exempt employers with fewer than 50 workers from this rule.

This rule does not currently exist under Swedish law. Employers must currently evaluate norms and practices for pay under the annual gender pay gap survey, but are not legally required to inform workers about these norms and practices. New legislation is therefore required to transpose the requirement into Swedish law. The Report suggests that this rule shall apply to all employers in Sweden (i.e. no exemption will apply).

Individual pay levels

At the request of a worker (directly or through a worker representative or equality body), employers must provide information on their individual pay level and the average pay levels, broken down by sex for categories of workers performing the same work or work of equal value. The employer must also inform workers annually about their right to request this information.

This rule does not currently exist under Swedish law and new legislation is therefore required to transpose the requirement into the law.

No secrecy clauses

Workers shall not be prevented from disclosing their pay for the purpose of the enforcement of the principle of equal pay and clauses in contracts prohibiting disclosure of pay information are prohibited.

This rule does not currently exist under Swedish law and new legislation is therefore required to transpose the requirement into the law.

Reporting requirements

Employer size threshold, start and frequency

Employers with 100 or more workers must prepare and publish gender pay gap reports. The start and frequency of that obligation will depend on worker numbers.

There is an existing statutory obligation for all employers in Sweden, irrespective of headcount, to conduct annual gender pay gap surveys. However, under current rules, employers with 10 employees or more only need to document their annual gender pay gap survey in writing but not draft a gender pay gap report (as defined under the Directive), or provide the gender pay gap survey to workers or authorities. New legislation is therefore required to transpose the requirements into Swedish law.

For the annual gender pay gap survey that is conducted under the current rules, it is also proposed in the Report that this must include a requirement for a comparison between female/male pay progression in connection with parental leave and pay progression for employees who perform equal work or work of equal value and have not taken such leave. This analysis does not need to be undertaken under the current rules for gender pay gap surveys.

Content of reporting

Reports must include:

• the gender pay gap (including in complementary or variable components)
• the mean gender pay gap (including in complementary or variable components)
• the median gender pay gap (including in complementary or variable components)
• the proportion of female/male workers receiving complementary or variable components
• the proportion of female/male workers in each pay quartile
• the gender pay gap by category of workers broken down by base pay and complementary or variable pay.

The accuracy of the report must be confirmed by management after consulting with workers’ representatives.

This rule does not currently exist under Swedish law and new legislation is therefore required to transpose the requirement into the law.

Provision / publication of report

Companies must provide the pay gap information to the national authorities designated for that purpose and may also publish it themselves on their website or otherwise make it publicly available.

This rule does not currently exist under Swedish law and new legislation is therefore required to transpose the requirement into the law.

Remedial action requirements

Employers must take steps to remedy unjustified pay gaps within a reasonable period of time in close cooperation with workers’ representatives, the labour inspectorate and/or the equality body..

Obligation to carry out joint pay assessment with workers’ representatives

This obligation arises where:

•  there is a 5% or higher pay gap in any category of workers;
• that gap is not justified by objective, gender-neutral criteria;
• the employer has failed to remedy within 6 months of report.

The joint pay assessment must include certain prescribed information and must be made available to workers and their representatives and at the request of the Labour Inspectorate and equality body.

There is already an obligation to cooperate in the process of annual gender pay gap surveys with workers and trade unions that are parties to the applicable collective bargaining agreement under Swedish law. Proposed new legislation provides further clarification and also expands some of the assessments to include trade unions that the employees are members of, where there is no collective bargaining agreement.

Under current rules, all pay gaps, irrespective of size, must be analysed and remedied as part of the annual gender pay gap survey. However, it is proposed that the gender pay gap report, which must be conducted under the Directive for companies with 100 or more workers, only needs to address, justify and remedy pay gaps of 5% or more.

In Sweden, the Discrimination Ombudsman (Sw: Diskrimineringsombudsmannen) will be the applicable equality body.