The gap in men’s and women’s pay is so large in 13 states, that a girl born today won’t see it close in her entire working life.
That’s according to an analysis of data on the year-round earnings of men and women who work full-time, released Wednesday by the Institute for Women’s Policy Researcher, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank. In the U.S. overall, the pay gap isn’t expected to close until 2059, if the pay of both genders goes up at the same rate it has risen at historically. “Intervention in some way is necessary or we’re just never going to get there,” Julie Anderson, a senior research associate at IWPR, said of pay equity.
There are a variety of reasons why the pay gap remains: jobs dominated by women tend to pay less than those dominated by men, women suffer disproportionately from government policies that don’t require paid family leave or subsidize child care. Bias, both conscious and unconscious, also plays a role.
Some states, like California, have already put policies in place, like providing workers with 55% of their wages for up to six weeks if they take time to care for a family member, that can help boost women’s outcomes by helping them stay in the labor force, Anderson said. In that state, the pay gap is expected to close in 2043, among the earliest in the country.
In Maryland, the gulf between men’s and women’s earnings is relatively small because many of the women workers in the state are highly educated and a large share of the workers of both genders work in government, a sector that tends to be more equal than others, because it’s essentially mandated, Anderson noted.
These states provide models of the kinds of policies that can lead to pay equity. But there are other, less optimistic, reasons for a small pay gap in some states, like Florida or Nevada. Those states are expected to achieve pay equity in 2038 and 2043, respectively, but that’s because men’s earnings in those states are relatively low.
On the other hand, a major reason why the gap in pay is so large in states like Wyoming, Louisiana and North Dakota, is because the economies of those states rely on resource-heavy, male-dominated industries, like construction and energy, Anderson said.
“In those states, male earnings are relatively high and women’s earnings are relatively low,” she said. The gulf isn’t expected to close in those regions until the 22nd century.
In addition to public policy initiatives, like paid family leave and subsidized child care, finding ways to coax women to work in traditionally male-dominated jobs could also help to close the pay gap, Anderson said. For women, it typically takes more education to make the same amount of money as men.
That’s because there are a variety of male-dominated sectors, like manufacturing and construction, that provide decent earnings, but don’t require a college degree. Female-dominated industries that require less than a bachelor’s degree, like home health care assistance, tend not to pay as well.
“If we can encourage women to get into some of those things that are not female dominated that will go a long way,” Anderson said.