80% Chinese women feel gender discrimination at work

More than 80 percent of women in China experienced gender discrimination at work, according to a survey carried out by one of China's largest job sites.

In the survey released just ahead of International Women's Day by Zhaopin.com, 81 percent of the female respondents said that they felt gender discrimination at work. About 22 percent of them said the discrimination was "serious," 59 percent said the discrimination was "moderate," and only 2 percent of female respondents said they experienced no discrimination at all.

The survey was based on answers from 128,576 respondents, 43 percent of whom were female.

About 74 percent of the male respondents said that they feel gender discrimination at work, slightly less than their female counterparts.

Working females holding higher qualifications experienced more discrimination, the survey found. About 43 percent of the female respondents with a master's degree or higher reported "serious gender discrimination," compared to 12 percent of women who graduated from high school, 18 percent of women who graduated from junior college, and 28 percent of women who have only attended college.

Working women have also reported gender discrimination in promotion. More than 80 percent of the female respondents said they had experienced discrimination in promotion, 25 percent reported "serious discrimination," while only 3 percent said they feel no discrimination at all.

Among all the respondents, 59 percent of men said they had their first promotion after working for two years, compared to 49 percent of women -- 10 percent less than men. And 72 percent of all the respondents said their immediate superiors were male while only 28 percent were female.