Male doctors should earn more than their female colleagues because they are more productive, claims a prominent health economist.
Professor Alan Maynard of York University said on average male consultants manage 10 to 15% more patients than their female counterparts.
The figures come from an analysis of consultants’ activity rates published last year.
He jokes that women see less patients because they spend more time listening to them - unlike their male counterparts: “Thus female consultants may process fewer patients but perhaps their diagnostic skills are superior and this may produce better outcomes for patients.”
Maynard’s comments are dismissed as “completely unhelpful” by Dr Helen Goodyear, a consultant paediatrician at Heartlands Hospital in Birmingham and president of the Medical Women’s Federation.
They follow a BMA report which reveals that men, on average, earn £15,000 a year more than women in medicine.
“There is no evidence for Professor Maynard’s comments. They come from one flawed study which had a number of misconceptions in it,” said Goodyear.
Women often earn less than men because they are not as forceful in their contract negotiations, she explained. “If a woman gets paid for seven sessions she will often actually do nine or ten. If a woman is on a full-time contract of 10 programmed activities her male counterpart will often be on 13 because they are not so shy in coming forward.”
If her pay was linked to productivity, Goodyear said her salary would immediately double.
The solution is for women to take more of the top leadership posts in the profession. “Women need more encouragement and mentorship to take on these roles. We need to do away with the old boys’ network where leaders who are stepping down nominate the next leader, as still happens in quite a number of posts within medicine,” said Goodyear.
But she said there is still a long way to go: “Although more women are coming in at the bottom in medicine, it is going to take at least 20 years for them to reach the top and to change the culture.”
A BMA spokesperson said there was no justification for a pay gap in the NHS of 2009. “Women doctors undertake the same training and perform the same tasks as their male counterparts - and should also receive the same level of pay.”
