Are Women Catching Up in Pay?

The NCPE and liberal groups like the National Women’s Law Center and the National Partnership for Women & Families maintain that women make only 77 cents for every dollar earned by men, and that the number has been stuck there for nearly ten years. At this rate, notes Sarah Crawford, Director of Workplace Fairness at the National Partnership for Women and Families, “We don’t expect the gap to close for four more decades.”

Crawford’s group and the National Women’s Law Center both sent me studies last week that analyzed 2012 Census Bureau data and underlined the 23-cent wage gap between women and men. The studies also broke down the gap in major metro areas and in the states. In some spots the gap was greater than the national figure. In Wyoming, for instance, women make 67 cents for every dollar earned by men, the biggest gap in the nation. Further, they looked at how non-white women’s wages compared with white men’s pay and they found even greater disparities. In Washington, D.C., for instance, African-American women make 53 cents on the dollar while Hispanic women make only 44 cents compared with white men. In the state of California, Latinas make 43 cents for every dollar earned by white men.