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The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap

 
You’ve probably heard that men are paid more than women are paid over their lifetimes. But what does that mean? Are women paid less because they choose lower-paying jobs? Is it because more women work part time than men do? Or is it because women have more caregiving responsibilities? And what, exactly, does gender bias have to do with paychecks?
AAUW’s The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap succinctly addresses these issues by going beyond the widely reported 80 percent statistic. The report explains the pay gap in the United States; how it affects women of all ages, races, and education levels; and what you can do to close it. In 2016, for the fifth anniversary of The Simple Truth, we updated the report with information on disability status, sexual orientation, and gender identity.
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How to Achieve Gender Equality

It’s no secret that, on average, women – even those with equivalent education and experience – typically earn less than men. The ratio of the average (mean) earnings of female workers (full- time, full-year, 25 to 69 years old) to that of their male counterparts was 0.72 in 2010. The pay ratio of median earners (those at the 50th percentile) for the same groups was 0.78. But that is not the whole story. 
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The Gender Pay Gap Is Largely Because of Motherhood

When men and women finish school and start working, they’re paid pretty much equally. But a gender pay gap soon appears, and it grows significantly over the next two decades.

So what changes? The answer can be found by looking at when the pay gap widens most sharply. It’s the late 20s to mid-30s, according to two new studies — in other words, when many women have children. Unmarried women without children continue to earn closer to what men do

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A new study from Lean In and McKinsey finds exactly how much more likely men are to get promoted than women

New research by LeanIn.Org and McKinsey & Co. yields some disturbing findings about women's prospects for advancement in the workplace. 

Though women and men say they want to be promoted in about equal numbers (75% and 78% respectively), women are significantly less likely to make it to the next tier in their organization.

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Speaking While Female →

Sheryl Sandberg and Adam Grant on Why Women Stay Quiet at Work - Many articles have discussed the tightrope phenomenon; where women are reserved to talk at meeting or assert ideas as they are often interrupted or ignored only to have male counterparts reiterate their thoughts and received credit. Sheryl and Adam also provide real solutions to the issue and examples that have worked for others in similar situations.

When Talking About Bias Backfires →

Adam Grant and Sheryl Sandberg on Discrimination at Work - Outing Implicit Bias is not enough. Studies have indicated that outing implicit bias without sending iterating that it is not acceptable and needs to change has negative or no impact on changing work culture and issues related to bias. The impact occurs when implicit bias discussions are followed by the message that it is not tolerable and actionable measures are put in place to speak out when it occurs and have the discussion.

Women, Work, and the Art of Gender Judo

Why practice gender judo if women are supposed to lean in and just ask for what they want? My interviews with 127 highly successful women show that more straightforward strategies can backfire. While plenty of glass ceilings have been shattered, most good jobs — from senator to scientist, comic to chief executive — are still seen as requiring what have traditionally been perceived as masculine qualities. Lawyers are aggressive; chief executives are decisive; techies are nerds; comics are obsessed with sex. So women have to behave in “masculine” ways to be seen as competent.
One problem: Women are still expected to be feminine.
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The Motherhood Penalty vs. the Fatherhood Bonus (A Child Helps Your Career, if You’re a Man) →

by Claire Cain Miller, NY Times September 8, 2014

"The data about the motherhood penalty and the fatherhood bonus present a clear-cut look at American culture’s ambiguous feelings about gender and work. Even in the age of “Lean In,” when women with children run Fortune 500 companies and head the Federal Reserve, traditional notions about fathers as breadwinners and mothers as caregivers remain deeply ingrained. Employers, it seems, have not yet caught up to the fact that women can be both mothers and valuable employees."
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