Weekly Post #6: “Gender pay gap in U.S. hasn’t changed much in two decades”

An article released by the Pew Research Center focuses on the gender pay gap in the United States. Essentially, the gender pay gap in the United States has pretty much stayed the same over the past 20 years. In 2022, women earned 82% of what men made, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of full- and part-time workers’ hourly earnings. Those results are about the same as in 2002 when women earned 80% of what men made. The article highlights that in spite of increasing female presence in higher-paying jobs previously dominated by men, women are still overrepresented in lower-paying occupations. Thus, this could partly explain the gender pay gap. Further, the article goes on to mention that there may be other factors contributing to the wage discrepancy that are difficult to measure, such as gender discrimination and gender roles. They stress that there is a difference in pressures for working women and men when it comes to caring for their families. Research shows that having children can reduce women’s earnings and having kids can increase men’s earnings. Interestingly, the Center’s survey found that 25 percent of employed U.S. adults are currently either their boss or the top manager at work. They were able to assess the data and found that a boss or top manager is more likely to be a man than a woman (28% versus 21%).

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/03/01/gender-pay-gap-facts/