Eighty years ago Roy Morgan’s first “Gallup Poll” asked Australians about ‘Equal pay for men and women’

Australia’s first “Gallup Poll” was conducted by Roy Morgan, the founder of Roy Morgan Research, on ‘equal pay for men and women’ eighty years ago. Interviewing for the survey began on September 15, 1941 and on October 4, 1941 the first finding was released showing 59% of Australians agreed with equal pay for men and women.

The survey in 1941 was conducted as women were increasingly active in the workforce of the war-time economy. At the time there were clear differences in response to the question based on personal circumstances with only 35% of the ‘well-to-do’ favouring equal pay compared to 53% of people ‘comfortably off’, 63% of ‘artisans’ and over two-thirds, 68%, of ‘the poor’.

There was little difference based on where people live with 58% of Australians living in Capital Cities in favour of equal pay for men and women, 56% of those living in Rural areas and 61% of people living in Other cities and towns. Two out of three Labor supporters (66%) voted in favour of equal pay compared to 52% of supporters of other parties.

Sixty-seven years later in May 2008, a Morgan Poll found that a nearly unanimous 98% of Australians believed in equal pay for women – the attitudes of Australians have changed!