In a country that prides itself on making major strides on gender equity, it’s shocking that one in four working women are being short-changed on their super each year.
This week, SMC released a new report that lays bare the scale of the challenge. Unpaid super costs the typical working woman in Australia more than $26,000 by the time she retires.
That’s on top of the fact that women already retire with a quarter less super than men. Unpaid super makes it harder to close that gender super gap.
Women miss out twice: first, when we take time out of the workforce to care for children or elderly parents, and again if super isn’t paid. That’s a double whammy.
Across the Australian community, the hardest hit by unpaid super are young, low-income women. One in two women earning less than $25,000-a-year in their 20s or 30s are not paid some or all of the super they’ve earned. These are the women working in childcare centres, aged care homes, hospitals and community services—roles essential to our society, yet too often undervalued and underpaid.
This is not just about fairness. It’s about economic security for millions of Australian women. It’s also about the integrity of our nation’s super system—one of Australia’s most important social and economic achievements to deliver dignity in retirement.
The good news? There’s a simple fix. It’s payday super.
Right now, employers are only obliged to pay super quarterly. Months can go by before a worker realises their super hasn’t been paid — if they notice at all. By then, the business might have folded, or the money might have vanished.
Payday super would require all employers to pay super at the same time they pay wages. This is a commonsense reform that would make it easier for workers to track the super that’s owed to them, and make it much easier for employers to stay on top of their cashflow and worker entitlements.
A lot of employers already pay super on paydays. They know it’s good for business and good for staff.
The Australian Government has promised to start payday super from 1 July 2026. That’s terrific. But at the time of writing, the legislation to make it happen hasn’t yet been introduced to Parliament.
We can’t afford to wait. Every week that goes by without this law in place, workers across Australia are underpaid a staggering $100 million in super.
SMC is calling on the Government to introduce its long-promised payday super laws urgently. A super system that delivers for all Australians means closing the gender gap, protecting the savings of people in low-paid and insecure jobs, and ensuring that the people who care for our children, our elderly and our communities are not left behind.
The time to pass payday super legislation is now — to strengthen super for all Australians.
This article was originally published in our weekly SuperWrap email. Sign up here.
