MILAN - It is a rare exception to the rule: the gender salary gap in the fashion industry means female models are paid more than their male counterparts for the same job.

None of the dozens of buffed and toned men parading at the latest Milan menswear shows since Friday can dream of earning anything like female catwalk stars, or of equivalent fame.

While the likes of Gisele Bundchen, Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell have long since passed beyond the confines to fashion to become A-list celebrities, their male equivalents, like Sean O'Pry or David Gandy, remain largely unknown to the general public.

Gandy once observed: "Trust me, to end up working in the only industry in the world where women get paid more than men, and treated loads better.

"In the hierarchy of a shoot, you have the photographer, the female model, the stylists, the assistants, then the male model. You are the lowest of the low."

Frederic Godart, a sociologist who specializes in fashion's place in society, explains: "Even if the markets for designer men's and women's clothes generate roughly the same sales, about $30 billion each, fashion remains an industry primarily aimed at women."

"The brands and the fashion magazines are more interested in a women's aesthetic assets, which help to sell product better and as a result that pushes up the value of female models," he said.

A 2013 survey by Forbes magazine estimated that top model Bundchen had earned $42 million in the previous year, 28 times the amount the best-earning male model, O'Pry, managed to pull in.

Male model Baptiste Nicol, however, insists that "you can still earn a good living without being in the top 100 in the world".

"Working 15 days a month on average for catalogs, shows and tests, I end up with the same income as a company executive," says the 32-year-old.

Pay differentials with female colleagues? "They exist but also between different men. And you have to take into account that a male model will have his best earning years between 30 and 50" - by which time most female models' maximum earning potential is behind them.

Agence France-Presse