Equal pay was a competitiveness clause

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A flight attendant, a French worry and a Gazzetta Ufficiale

In 1957 six countries signed the Treaty of Rome, the founding text of what would become the European Union. Most of it deals with customs duties and the common market. Tucked in the middle is Article 119: men and women should receive equal pay for equal work.

Noble, yes. But look at who asked for it. According to the historians of the Treaty, it was France, which already applied the principle at home and feared its companies would be undercut by competitors that did not. Equal pay entered European law as a competitiveness clause. Years later the Court of Justice would say the article pursues a double aim, economic and social. The economic one was there from the start.

For almost twenty years Article 119 was mostly a declaration of intent. Then came Gabrielle Defrenne, a flight attendant at the Belgian airline Sabena, who took the text literally. She had been hired in 1951, and her contract ended at her fortieth birthday, while male colleagues doing the same job could stay on much longer. With her lawyer Éliane Vogel-Polsky she argued that an individual could invoke Article 119 directly in court. On 8 April 1976 the Court agreed.

Fast-forward fifty years. Directive (EU) 2023/970 asked every member state to turn pay transparency into national law by 7 June 2026. Most missed it: by early September only five had fully transposed it (Slovakia, Lithuania, Italy, Malta and Greece). Italy did it with Legislative Decree no. 96 of 7 May 2026, published in the Gazzetta Ufficiale on 1 June and in force from 7 June.

What the decree says, in short (article numbers in brackets):

• Hiring (art. 5): every job ad must state the starting pay or the pay band, set on objective, gender-neutral criteria, together with the relevant provisions of the collective agreement (CCNL) the employer applies. Asking candidates about current or past pay is banned, including through a recruiter. Ads must be gender-neutral, even in the professional titles they ask for.
• Inside the company (art. 6): the criteria used to set pay and pay progression must be accessible to employees. An employer applying a CCNL signed by the most representative unions can meet this by pointing to the CCNL’s criteria, levels and pay terms. Employers under 50 employees are exempt from the progression part.
• Right to information (art. 7): once a year, in writing, employees can ask for the average pay, broken down by gender, of the category of workers doing the same work or work of equal value. The employer has two months to answer and can meet the duty by publishing the data on its intranet. Employees must be reminded of this right every year.
• Reporting (art. 9): employers with 100 or more employees report their gender pay gap, on a calendar that depends on size.

Employer size	First report	Frequency
250+ employees	7 June 2027	Every year
150 to 249	7 June 2027	Every three years
100 to 149	7 June 2031	Every three years

And if a report shows a gap of 5% or more in the average pay of any category of workers, the employer cannot justify it with objective, gender-neutral criteria, and does not fix it within six months, a joint pay assessment with workers’ representatives follows (art. 10).

Two Italian twists. First, applying a collective agreement signed by the most representative unions creates a presumption that pay and classification systems comply (art. 4), unless an individual discriminatory treatment is proven. Second, the Minister of Labour was due to issue decrees on data collection within 90 days, by about 5 September 2026, and may issue guidance on the key definitions until 31 December 2026. Watch for both.

In a job ad, in practice. What follows is my reading of good practice, not a rule in the decree. The decree defines “pay” broadly, variable components included, while the “pay level” counts only fixed and continuous elements (art. 3). This is how I would handle it in an ad:

• The headline figure: the annual gross fixed pay (RAL) as a range, including collective-agreement items such as the 13th and 14th month.
• The range: start from the midpoint, the market median for the role, level and location; the minimum sits about 15% below and the maximum about 15% above. Before posting, check that nobody already in the same role at the same level is below the minimum: if someone is, ask why and, if there is no objective reason, realign them; otherwise lower the minimum to their pay.
• The width: with this method about 35% from minimum to maximum, a little more if the minimum drops to include current employees, with written criteria (experience, skills, certifications) that explain where a candidate lands. The decree asks for objective, gender-neutral criteria (art. 5) and sets no limit on width.

Variable pay and benefits stay out of the ad. Bonus, MBO, welfare and benefits come later, in the offer letter, when the candidate has what they need to judge them. Never an “up to” figure that adds fixed and variable pay together.

One question to take away. The whole machinery hangs on a phrase that sounds harmless: same work or work of equal value. In Italy the decree ties it to your collective agreement: same work means the same level and category in the CCNL, equal value means different work at comparable levels, judged on skills, responsibilities and working conditions (art. 4). Pick two jobs at different levels of your grid, say a customer service specialist and a warehouse planner. Can you explain in two sentences why they are, or are not, comparable on those three yardsticks? Does your own job grid add something the CCNL does not say? And can you write down what places a candidate within the range? If the answers take a meeting, the gap is not in your spreadsheet. It is in your job architecture.

In 1957 equal pay was a way to level the playing field between competitors. In 2026 it is a way to level the information between employer and employee. Same playing field, only the scoreboard is now visible.

Want the other 26 countries? Our free guide, Pay transparency: from the EU Directive to the salary range, compares all 27 member states on job postings, employee rights and reporting to authorities, and shows step by step how to build the range you publish. Subscribe to Reward Stories and we will send you the link by email.

-B

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice: for decisions about your organisation, please consult a qualified employment lawyer.

Sources

• Decreto legislativo 7 maggio 2026, n. 96, text as published in the Gazzetta Ufficiale n. 125 of 1 June 2026
• Directive (EU) 2023/970, EUR-Lex
• Leading judgments of the European Court (on the origin of Article 119)
• Oxford Human Rights Hub: What has the European Union ever done for women?
• University of Stirling: Defrenne v Sabena (No 2)
• Ius Laboris: EU Pay Transparency Directive, which countries have transposed
• Corporate INTL: Which countries have implemented the Directive