Female bosses earn 26% less than males

Senior female managers earn an average of $93,000 less each year than their male colleagues, according to a new report.

Women are falling further behind in pay equality as they climb the corporate ladder.

Senior female managers earn an average of $93,000 less each year than their male counterparts, a gap of 26.5 per cent, according to a new report by Curtin Unviersity's Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre, in collaboration with the Workplace Gender Equality Agency.

Pay gaps among managers are exacerbated by a greater share of discretionary pay, including bonuses, being awarded to men, the report said.

For top-tier managers, nearly $40,000 of the difference in annual pay is made up of additional remuneration including bonuses.

"Not only do female-dominated organisations tend to be lower paid, but this analysis shows that in workplaces with heavily female-dominated management teams there are large gender pay gaps in favour of men," BCEC Principal Research Fellow Rebecca Cassells said.

"It seems that where the men are few, they are more highly valued."

WGEA director Libby Lyons said the report showed workplaces with a greater gender balance in their leadership teams have a smaller pay gap.

Gender pay gaps were 10 per cent on average in organisations with a balanced representation of women in senior leadership roles.

And the research shows mining - Australia's most male-dominated industry - awards the highest average pay to women.

Women employed full-time in the mining industry earned $139,053 in 2015/16 on average.

"We must address the stereoptypes dictating the work women and men 'should' do, if Australia is to meet the social and economic challenges in the decades ahead," Ms Lyons said.

The report was based on 4,697 reports submitted on behalf of more than 12,000 employers, from April 2015 to March 2016, capturing four million employees, or around 40 per cent of the workforce.