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A new CareerBuilder.com survey finds one-in-five women are paid less than men and feel they have fewer advancement opportunities, while job satisfaction declines for both.

The same amount of women — one-in-five — reported they have fewer opportunities for career advancement than men at their current organizations, according to the recent Men and Women at Work 2004 survey..

When asked why they think men are paid more, four-in-10 women attribute it to favoritism shown by men in management to other men in the organization. Twenty-four percent of men say men are paid more because of seniority.

In terms of overall satisfaction with compensation, 54 percent of women say they are unhappy with pay compared to 49 percent of men. The desire to be better compensated may be why 63 percent of women and 57 percent of men say they are unwilling to accept a pay cut, even if it was in exchange for a more satisfying job.

How well one is paid often corresponds with how high one has climbed up the company ladder. While women feel they have fewer opportunities for career advancement than men, four-in-10 men and women agree that career advancement opportunities are lacking at their present employers.

While almost half of both men and women are satisfied with their career progress to date, three-in-ten men and women are dissatisfied.

”Thirty-one percent of both men and women are dissatisfied with their career progress, which is often measured by pay and title,” said Rosemary Haefner, vice president of Human Resources for CareerBuilder.com. ”To enhance job satisfaction and retain key workers, employers need to ensure that their compensation is competitive within their industry and region and carve out promising career paths for their workers.”

When asked about interactions in the workplace, around half of men and women said they are not bothered by behaviors of the opposite sex. However, 10 percent of men say they are annoyed by women who talk excessively or gossip and 8 percent feel that women use their feminine attributes to their advantage.

Eleven percent of women are bothered by men who exhibited some form of sexual harassment (inappropriate behavior, sexual comments or unwanted physical contact) and 7 percent say they are irritated by men who act arrogant or superior.

Men and women both reported a decline in overall job satisfaction year-over-year. Fifty-four percent of men and 56 percent of women are currently satisfied with their jobs. That’s down from 2003 when 59 percent of both men and women were satisfied.

The new CareerBuilder.com survey, was conducted from April 6 to April 19, 2004 among 634 men and 764 women. To collect data for the survey, CareerBuilder.com commissioned SurveySite to use an e- mail methodology whereby individuals who are members of SurveySite Web Panel were randomly selected and approached by e-mail invitation to participate in the online survey.

This article was first published on CIOupdate.com.