March 12th marks Equal Pay Day, a sobering reminder of the persistent gender pay gap in the United States. Across the country, women typically earn just 84 cents for every dollar paid to their male counterparts in equivalent roles. This disparity translates to a sum of $9,900 less in annual income for women.
The Pay Gap describes the persistent wage disparity between men and women performing equivalent work. Despite its pervasiveness, this issue garnered little substantive action from Congress until the Equal Pay Act of 1963. The roots of legislative efforts trace back to the 1940s when the first bill was introduced to outlaw “discrimination against any employee, in the rate of compensation paid, on account of sex” as an unfair labor practice. However, this bill never passed.
It took until the 1960s for the breakthrough Equal Pay Act to finally become law, prohibiting employers from paying unequal wages to male and female workers for “jobs the performance of which requires equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and which are performed under similar working conditions.” This groundbreaking act represented the initial federal stride toward mandating pay equity between genders performing commensurate labor.
However, the Equal Pay Act still allowed loopholes for pay disparities based on factors like seniority and merit-based compensation structures. The campaign for pay equity expanded in the 1980s to encompass racial dimensions, as it became clear women of color faced even wider pay gaps. The language shifted from the “pay gap” to “comparable worth,” scrutinizing pay discrepancies between jobs requiring comparable levels of responsibility and value, even if not identical roles. These inequities were linked to long-standing discrimination.
The pay gap’s compounding effects reverberate far beyond the workplace. With lower lifetime earnings, women continue to receive diminished Social Security benefits and pensions upon retirement. Consequently, their overall retirement income amounts to a mere 70% of what men receive, perpetuating economic inequity into their golden years. Despite claims of progress toward equality, this day underscores the deep-rooted inequalities ingrained in our society.
Even higher education offers no refuge from the pervasive gender pay gap, a recent U.S. Census Bureau report finds. Women still earn a mere 71 cents for every dollar paid to their male counterparts at equivalent levels of educational attainment, and yet women are now comprising over half of college-educated workers and are participating in the labor force at unprecedented rates.
Closing the gender pay gap requires a multi-faceted approach to address the various factors contributing to the disparity. Raising the minimum wage would have an immediate impact, as women are overrepresented in low-wage jobs. Increasing pay transparency by allowing open compensation discussions and prohibiting retaliation for wage disclosures can narrow the gap by up to 30%, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research. Implementing fair scheduling policies that provide predictability and flexibility is important for working mothers and those with caregiving responsibilities, while expanding paid family and medical leave would allow more women to remain employed after having children. Finally, conducting pay audits and correcting any gender-based disparities within the workplace is crucial for promoting pay equity.
