The Association of Consulting Architects (ACA) has released its national salary report and analysis for 2022, finding the gender pay gap is still a pertinent issue across the profession, and some architectural students are still paid below the award rate.
The perennial study of workplace conditions gathers data on 31 different roles within the architecture profession. The ACA said in 2022 it received its highest participation rate yet, with 235 practices reporting 2,907 staff.
Pay ranges within role categories varied greatly, with the highest paid architects earning on average 4.5 times more than the lowest paid architectural staff.
In a concerning revelation, 7.8 percent of practices are currently paying their students below the award rate. However, only 36 percent of practices revealed their data concerning students, meaning this figure was pulled from only 77 reports.
The gender pay gap for architects still persists, with men paid more on average in all but two of the nine different level categories.
At the new associate level and registered architect up to three years, men and women are paid the same, and for new director/principal level, pays were demonstrably similar.
However, for the remaining six categories, men’s salaries were found do be significantly higher on average, with the disparity widening at the experienced director/principal level.
The gender breakdown across all staff in the industry revealed a split of 39 percent women and 61 percent men. This divide was less prominent at junior levels, while moving up the hierarchy, men in senior roles increases dramatically with four times as many men at director/principal level than women.
The survey found that of the respondent practices, more than 29 percent reported that they had offering a salary increase between 3 and 5 percent, which was marginally less than the 2019 survey.
The proportion of practices who reported that they had increased salaries by the CPI or less decreased from 53 percent in 2019 to 43 percent in 2022.
The highest reported increase was within the 6 to 10 percent category, with 23 percent of respondent practices offering this salary increase compared to just 9 per cent in 2019. The 11 to 20 percent category increased by almost double the number reported in 2019.
The survey found that in 2022, larger practices had higher pay rates, particularly for employees in senior and director or principal roles.
The survey also found the percentage of practices offering staff bonus benefits had dropped dramatically this year, with almost 60 percent of practices offering no bonuses compared to 40 percent in 2019.
The full 2022 National Salary Survey report is available to ACA members.
