I agree with president of the Singapore Committee for UN Women Trina Liang-Lin that having more women in the workforce is essential for Singapore's economic growth (The $ question women workers must ask; Feb 10).

One of the actions to counter income disparity between men and women suggested by Ms Liang-Lin is for the Singapore Government to continue being the standard-bearer.

One of the reasons why income disparity still exists might be that there are more men in the Government.

Policymakers may overlook this issue as the majority of them are men and they may not realise the magnitude of the problem.

According to Ministry of Social and Family Development data, the differences in wages between men and women who worked as professionals, managers and in service and sales from 2012 to 2016 ranged from 10.1 per cent to 19.9 per cent.

This indicates that the issue of income disparity has not been critically analysed and tackled by policymakers.

Hence, before we even look into the gender pay gap at large, we must first look at the government sector.

When the gender imbalance in the Government has been rectified, then we can start talking about the imbalance in society.

Siti Nurhumaira, 17

Junior College Year 2 student

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