PLife Is Not Fair and the Gender Wage Gap Continues to Prove It Christina Mezzour I sat in on a discussion with a few male and female colleagues outside of the office at a global tax conference initially talking business. More specifically about global implications of the U.S. tax reform and apportionment factors on state filings. As tax professionals our conversations tend to evolve into heated discussions as individuals defend tax positions and the impact to the bottom line. As our discussions continued the topic of conversation went another direction as one woman named Miao was asked about one of her new hire employees. It was at that point the subject at hand shifted and wage discrimination was brought to the table more specifically the Gender Wage Gap. Miao shared that she could not imagine being offered her new hire’s salary when she began her career in Tax Accounting 10 years ago. Miao’s new hire pay range was based on the company grid for her employee’s level and position and can certainly be negotiated. I was blown away by some of the comments that men shared. One man commented about how women lack negotiating skills and do not speak up for themselves. Another man began his reply with saying, “all due respect, life is not fair” which was clearly disrespectful, insulting and most certainly controversial. To provide some background in 1963 President John F. Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act (EPA) of 1963 which makes it illegal to pay different wages to men and women if they perform equal work in the same workplace. All forms of compensation are covered by this law, including salary, overtime pay, bonuses, stock options, profit sharing and bonus plans, life insurance, vacation and holiday pay, cleaning or gasoline allowances, hotel accommodations, reimbursement for travel expenses, and benefits. If it is determined there is an inequality in wages between men and women the employer may not reduce the wages of either men or women to equalize their pay. The law also makes it illegal to retaliate against a person if the person complained about discrimination, filed a charge of discrimination, or participated in an employment discrimination investigation or lawsuit. That law was passed in 1963 and here we are at the end of 2018 and the gender wage gap continues to exist. As a measure of the difference between men’s and women’s average earnings for the same work is not equal and is 20% less than men’s earnings. The wage gap between what men and women has challenged every effort to close it. Based on 2018 statistical analysis of median hourly earnings of fulltime and part time workers in the United States women earn 82% of what men earned, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of median hourly earnings. Based on this 2017 gender wage analysis, a woman would need to work any additional 47 days to earn equal pay as men performing the same job in 2017. On average women are paid 20% less than men in the U.S. If we dig deeper and look at the numbers by ethnicity and gender the wage gap increase. For African American women they are paid 38% less than men. Latina women are paid almost 50% less than white men at approximately 46 cents on the dollar . Among women who hold full-time, year-round jobs in the United States, Black women are typically paid 61 cents, Native American women 58 cents and Latinas just 53 cents for every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men. White, non-Hispanic women are paid 77 cents and Asian women 85 cents for every dollar paid to white, non Hispanic men, although some ethnic subgroups of Asian women fare much worse. The wage gap also varies by state and congressional district but spans nearly all corners of the country. There are many causes as to why the wage gap continues to exist which includes discrimination and bias. When women are compared to men, women tend to hold lower wage jobs, work in lower wage industries, and spend less time in the formal workforce due to pervasive stereotypes regarding gender and work accompanied by lack of support from bosses to for family caregiving, along with gender and racial discrimination. Statistical analysis shows that even after controlling for factors like occupational and industry differences, differences in experience and education, and region and unionization which are not independently the result of women’s preference. As 38 percent of the wage gap is unaccounted for researcher concludes that factors such as discrimination and unconscious bias continue to affect women’s wages.2 There has been blame that the gap is a statistical error as it is the women who chose to take maternity leave and have children or women do not mind the low paying professions. The gender gap in pay has narrowed since 1980, but it has remained relatively stable over the past 15 years. By comparison, the Census Bureau claims that in 2016 women working fulltime annually earned 80% of what men earned. Which calculates In the EQUAL PAY 2018 SURVEY FINDING One in three Americans is not aware of the gender pay gap and men are almost twice as likely as women to think it does not exist. By addressing the differences in average wages and continuing to bring awareness to the issue will assist in closing the pay gap. If one in three women are unaware of the pay gap, then clearly, they are unaware they are missing 20% pay. To put numbers to the missing 20%, pay over the course of their career women would not be kept silent. If you calculate what 20% pay equates to over the course of a woman’s 40-year career she would earn over $400,000 more. African American women will lose $867,920 while Latinas the career losses mount to $1,056,120. If we don’t act to close the wage gap, a woman just starting out today stands to lose hundreds of thousands of dollars over the course of her career, undercutting her ability to provide for herself and her family, as well as her retirement security. As the numbers speak for themselves the wage gap exists regardless of education level. Women with master’s degrees working full time, year-round are paid just 75 cents for every dollar paid to men with master’s degrees who work full time, year-round. Full-time, year-round workers, women who hold an associate’s degrees are paid less than men with just a high school diploma, and women with master’s degrees are paid less than men with bachelor’s degrees. Across all industries, women are paid lower salaries than men. There is a cultural bias behind the gender pay gap. One of the crucial issues centers around maternity leave and childcare. As men are allotted time off for paternity leave as women do for the maternity leave, then equality will be brought to the workplace. Equal rights for the parental leave will provide all both men and women equal risk for the employer and promotional advancement will then be based on skill set and competence. The gender gap will decrease in time and eventually become history when all individuals are treated as equals. Having a flexible schedule often comes at with a price tag especially in the corporate, financial, and legal environment. As we work toward closing the wage gap despite the federal Equal Pay Act of 1963 researcher warn that women and men will not reach pay parity until 2059 unless we start to change. At this point, without supportive policies and bias together to make equal pay elusive. There are federal policy solutions that would help for example, Fair pay protections and practices. Family friendly workplace standards, full funding for federal agencies to investigate and enforce fair pay. As my colleague commented on how life is not fair my reply to all is life is not fair, but it sure does help when you have support to enforce fairness. The gender wage gap is an example of the work we still need to do to help our nation ensure women can not only participate equally as men in our economy but get paid equally as well, regardless if life is not fair. References: https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/equalcompensation.cfm https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2014/04/09/president-obamas-persistent-77-cent-claim-on-the-wage-gap-gets-a-new-pinocchio-rating/?noredirect=on&;utm_term=.017e9948d40b http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/04/09/gender-pay-gap-facts/ft_18-04-06_wage_gap/ http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/04/09/gender-pay-gap-facts/ http://scholar.harvard.edu/files/goldin/files/goldin_aeapress_2014_1.pdf https://www.epi.org/publication/womens-work-and-the-gender-pay-gap-how-discrimination-societal-norms-and-other-forces-affect-womens-occupational-choices-and-their-pay/ http://www.nationalpartnership.org/research-library/workplace-fairness/fair-pay/americas-women-and-the-wage-gap.pdf 1. Ariane Hegewisch and Emma Williams-Baron, “The Gender Wage Gap: 2016; Earnings Differences by Gender, Race, and Ethnicity,” IWPR #C459 (September 2017), https://iwpr.org/publications/gender-wage-gap-2016-earnings-differences-gender-race-ethnicity/. Black women are paid $0.625 for every $1 that white men earn, leading to a pay gap for Black women of 37.5%. 2. Institute for Women’s Policy Research, “Pay Equity & Discrimination,” https://iwpr.org/issue/employment-education-economic-change/pay-equity-discrimination/. 3. https://nwlc.org/resources/the-lifetime-wage-gap-state-by-state/ 4. http://www.nationalpartnership.org/research-library/workplace-fairness/fair-pay/african-american-women-wage-gap.pdf 1 U.S. Census Bureau. (2018). Current Population Survey, Annual Social and Economic (ASEC) Supplement: Table PINC-05: Work Experience in 2017 – People 15 Years Old and Over by Total Money Earnings in 2017, Age, Race, Hispanic Origin, Sex, and Disability Status. Retrieved 13 September 2018, from https://www.census.gov/data/tables/timeseries/demo/income-poverty/cps-pinc/pinc-05.html (Unpublished calculation based on the median annual pay for all women and men who worked full time, year-round in 2018) 2 Glynn, S.J. (2018, April). Gender wage inequality: What we know and how we can fix it. Washington Center for Equitable Growth Publication. Retrieved 13 September 2018, from https://equitablegrowth.org/research-paper/gender-wage-inequality/?longform=true 3 See note 1. 4 Ibid. Despite an overall wage gap for Asian women in the United States that is smaller than for other groups of women of color, there are substantial variations in the wage 5 U.S. Census Bureau. (2018). American Community Survey 1-Year Estimates 2017, Geographies: All States within United States and Puerto Rico, Table B20017: Median Earnings in the Past 12 Months by Sex by Work Experience in the Past 12 Months (in 2017 Inflation-Adjusted Dollars) for the Population 16 Years and Over with Earnings in the Past 12 Months. Retrieved 13 September 2018, from https://factfinder.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml?pid=ACS_17_1YR_B20017&;prodType=table 7 See note 1; U.S. Census Bureau. (2018). Current Population Survey, Annual Social and Economic (ASEC) Supplement: Table PINC-01. Selected Characteristics of People 15 Years and Over, by Total Money Income in 2017, Work Experience in 2017, Race, Hispanic Origin, and Sex. Retrieved 13 September 2018, from https://www.census.gov/data/tables/timeseries/demo/income-poverty/cps-pinc/pinc-01.html
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