Gender Wage Gap
- The median weekly earnings for full-time female workers were about 80.4 percent of men’s earnings, according to fourth-quarter 2015 statistics by the U.S. Department of Labor.
- African-American women were paid 63 percent of what white men earned in 2014, while Hispanic women were paid only 54 percent, the American Association of University Women, or AAUW reported.
- Earnings for both female and male full-time workers tend to increase with age, with a plateau after 45 and a drop after age 65. Women typically earn about 90 percent of what men are paid until they hit age 35. After that, median earnings for women are typically from 76 to 81 percent of what men are paid, according to the AAUW.
- As a rule, earnings climb as years of education increase for both men and women; however, while more education is a useful tool for increasing earnings, it is not effective against the gender pay gap. At every level of academic achievement, women’s median earnings are less than men’s.
- The gender pay gap persists across educational levels, even among college graduates, AAUW reported. As a result, women who earn college degrees are less able to pay off their student loans promptly, leaving them in debt longer than men.
- In 2014, the wage gap was smallest in Washington, D.C., where women were paid 90 percent of what men earned, and largest in Louisiana, where women earned 65 percent of what men were paid, according to the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey.
Sources: U.S. Department of Labor; American Association of University Women: "The Simple Truth About The Gender Pay Gap"; the American Community Survey; U.S. Census Bureau