Birch said being a female plumber she had often shocked customers but she had definitely noticed changing attitudes to women in the trades.
"My boss is very encouraging with me doing the work. But I was drawn to this trade because my dad is a drainlayer and when I was little I would go to work with him every day and really enjoyed it.
"All of the sponsors and other tradies I have met, they are all lovely about it. It doesn't even bother them. They see me as just a plumber and not my gender."
Birch was the second female the company has hired although the survey found the "trades, services and engineering" sector was just 1 per cent female out of the 10,000 participants in the survey.
Rotorua resident Gina Reuben has been a roofer since she was 19 but was lost for words when she heard the pay gap.
"You are paid what you are capable of. I am good at what I do and I feel I'm paid for what I do," she said.
"If you're good and you are not getting paid your worth, then you really need to be going into the office to talk about it."
Reuben said aside from women in trades being great workers, she had seen more women become independent from companies.
OneStaff group general manager Jonathan Ives, who conducted the survey, said Tauranga had experienced continued growth over the past 18 months which brought the need for more housing, infrastructure and commercial sites.
"During the kiwifruit season, general labour options decrease dramatically and this year it has not bounced back as quickly as in previous years," Ives said.
"The challenge in this market is to encourage better pay rates to attract and retain quality candidates, on par with Auckland and Wellington. So much quality talent is lost due to lower wages and conditions."
In Northland and Auckland, workers were paid the highest at $25 an hour but Ives said Northland's cost of living was significantly lower than the metropolitan areas.
