Researchers wanted to know the gender split on research funding so they looked at who got 50 000 ARC and NHMRC awards

They found less total grants for women, especially at senior-career levels –  in part because there were 16,799 fewer women than men in the research workforce (averaged for 2014-17)

The findings are in a paper by Isabelle Kingsley and colleagues*, which includes;

* percentage of awarded grants led by women increased from 28 per cent (2000) to 37 per cent (2020) across all academic levels, field of research, and funding scheme

* percentage of women-led grants decreased with seniority. At professor level, women-led grants doubled to 31 per cent 2000-2020, but remained “well below” parity

* success rates increased with the seniority of lead investigators, irrespective of gender

Overall, “gender differences in awarded grants broadly matched differences in application and workforce participation rates within each field of research.”

But men were in the money: More of them, especially at senior levels meant that over 20 years they picked up way-more ARC  and NHMRC funding, $7.5bn to women-led grants and $19.1 billion to men-led.

* Isabelle Kingsley (Office of the Women in STEM Ambassador), Eve Slavich (UNSW), Lisa Harvey-Smith (Women in STEM Ambassador), Emma L Johnston (Uni Sydney) and Lisa A Williams (UNSW)  “Gender differences in Australian research grant awards, applications, amounts, and workforce participation,” Open Science Framework, HERE