A handsome man can earn a fifth more than a plainer colleague but a beautiful woman is not paid a penny more than her average-looking colleague, new research has shown.

The study by senior economists found that being good-looking meant male workers could earn 22 percent more than average-looking colleagues.

Researchers said good looks did not give women a similar advantage.

Andrew Leigh, the former economics professor at the Australian National University who co-authored the report, said: "Beauty can be a double-edged sword for women.

"Some people still believe good looks and intelligence are incompatible in women so a good-looking woman can't be that productive, but there's no dumb-blonde syndrome affecting men's pay."

He said that although he believed good-looking women may also earn more, the research did not support his theory.

The research found that handsome men in all jobs, from manual labour to highly-paid professional careers, can earn 22 percent more than their colleagues doing an identical role.

Men with below-average looks face an uphill battle in the office, with ugliness reducing a man's earnings by 26 percent compared to an average-looking worker.

Former male model Ian Mitchell, 28, who has a first class degree in history from Edinburgh and now works for a cosmetics company, told the Sunday Times: "It gives you confidence, and I suspect people tend to warm to you more quickly."

The study, entitled Unpacking the Beauty Premium, was the largest exercise of its kind and repeated a survey from 1984 to see if the beauty premium had changed.

Leigh said the research showed people in the workplace were "lookist" and he hoped the findings would encourage employers to reverse their prejudice.

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(Source: Telegraph)