Liz Watson, Senior Advisor

Tomorrow, the Census Bureau will release new data on poverty, income, and health insurance in the U.S. in 2011. As we get ready to crunch numbers, we thought it would be helpful to take a deeper look at what these numbers tell us – and don’t tell us – about the wage gap.

The typical American woman who works full time, year round was still paid only 77 cents for every dollar paid to her male counterpart in 2010. For women of color, the gap is even larger. This blog post provides details about the wage gap measure that the Census Bureau and the National Women’s Law Center use, factors contributing to the wage gap, and how to shrink the gap.

What’s behind NWLC’s wage gap figure?

The wage gap figure that NWLC reports at the national level is the same as that reported by the Census Bureau – the median earnings of women full-time, year-round workers as a percentage of the median earnings of men full-time, year-round workers. Median earnings describe the earnings of a worker at the 50th percentile – right in the middle. Earnings include wages, salary, net self-employment income but not property income, government cash transfers or other cash income – so basically the money people see in their paychecks. Working full time is defined as working at least 35 hours a week and working year round means working at least 50 weeks during the last twelve months.

The national wage gap data come from the Current Population Survey and include workers 15 and older. The wage gap is not broken down by occupation or industry, though data on earnings by industry and occupation for women and men are available from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

In honor of Labor Day, here’s a snapshot of how working women are faring in today’s economy, by the numbers.

• Percentage of college graduates earning bachelor’s degrees who are women: 57.
• Percentage of students earning master’s degrees who are women: 60.
• Years of college that a man must attend, on average, to earn approximately the same as a woman with a four-year degree: 2.
• The typical number of cents paid to a full-time, year-round woman worker for every dollar paid to her male counterpart: 77.
• The typical number of cents paid to an African-American full-time, year-round woman worker for every dollar paid to a white, non-Hispanic man: 62.
• The typical number of cents paid to a Latina full-time, year-round woman worker for every dollar paid to a white, non-Hispanic man: 54.