PowerPoint Presentation

THE SIMPLE TRUTH about theGender Pay Gap

[Introduce yourself.]

The American Association of University Women (AAUW) is a nationwide network of more than 170,000 members and supporters, 1,000 branches, and 800 college/university partner members. [www.aauw.org/join]

Formore than 130 years, AAUW members have examined and taken positions on the fundamental issues of the dayeducational, social, economic, and political. Our commitment to our mission of advancing equity for women and girls is reflected in all aspects of our work.

1The pay gap is a comparison between womens and mens typical earnings.

It can be compared by weekly earnings or annual earnings.

[Insert your state pay gap here.]What Is the Pay Gap?The pay gap is one of the most pressing issues for women today. This presentation provides an overview of this important topic, which we hope will help you explain it to others.

The gender pay gap is a comparison of womens and mens median earnings.

Median earnings are typical, not average, earnings. Looking at the salaries of all women and men working full time, the median is the number in the middle of the group. We often say typical to refer to median because it is the person right in the middle. Half of the people earn more, and half earn less.

[Why not use averages? Because very high earnings can pull up the average, but they dont pull up the middle point in the same way. Average wages tend to be higher than median wages.]

Earnings are usually measured on a weekly or annual basis. Both are valid ways of comparing earnings.

[State pay gap data can be found on page 7 of The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap.]2The earnings ratio and the pay gap for 2013 are calculated using these formulas: What Is the Pay Gap?Earnings ratio = womens median earnings mens median earnings Pay gap = [mens median earnings womens median earnings] mens median earnings = 78%= 22%The calculation of the earnings ratio and the pay gap is simple [read chart].

The earnings ratio for 2013 was 78 percent, and the pay gap was 22 percent.

The numbers displayed here represent the pay gap on a national level. However, using this same formula and current data from the U.S. Census Bureau, we can calculate the pay gap for individual states. Our states pay gap can be found on page 7 of The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap.

3The Pay Gap over Time Womens Median Annual Earnings as a Percentage of Mens Median Annual Earnings for Full-time, Year-Round Workers, 19732013

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Survey While the pay gap has steadily narrowed over time, it is nowhere near being eliminated, and in recent years progress has actually stalled. In the 10 years between 2003 and 2013, the pay gap has barely budged, changing from 77 percent in 2012 to 78 percent in 2013a change that is not significantly different.

4Women and men tend to choose different majors in college and to work in different occupations after college.

Women tend to work fewer hours, even when they work full time.

Women are more likely than men to leave the workforce or to work part time when they have young children.

Choices can account for some of the differences in salaries, but they arent the whole story.

What about Choices?Sometimes, women and men makes choices that affect their salaries, and in turn, this affects the pay gap.

Men and women still tend to choose different majors in college and to work in different occupations after college.

Women also tend to work fewer hours, even when they work full time. (Full-time work is defined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics as 35 hours a week or more.)

Women are more likely than men to leave the workforce or work part time when they have young children.

Choices account for some of the differences in salaries, but they arent the whole story.

The 2012 AAUW report Graduating to a Pay Gap: The Earnings of Women and Men One Year after College Graduation examines this question. After accounting for the issues raised above as well as others, our study found that there was a 7 percent difference in the earnings of women and men one year after college graduation that was still unexplained. 5The Pay Gap and Race/EthnicityMedian Annual Earnings, by Race/Ethnicity and Gender, 2013

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community SurveyThe pay gap affects women from all backgrounds, but its effects vary among different demographics.

The chart shown here lays out the pay gap by race and ethnicity among full-time workers in 2013.

You can see that Hispanics, African Americans, American Indians and Alaskan Natives, and Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders, both women and men, had lower median earnings than non-Hispanic whites and Asian Americans.

Women were paid less than men were within each racial and ethnic group, and the pay gap between men and women was smaller among African Americans, Hispanics, American Indians, and Native Hawaiians compared with whites and Asian Americans.

It is clear from the chart, however, that this smaller gender pay gap among these groups is due solely to the fact that American Indian, Native Hawaiian, African American, and Hispanic men were paid substantially less than non-Hispanic white and Asian American men were paid in 2013.

Asian American and white women were paid more than other women, and Asian American men were paid the highest wages of any group.

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The Pay Gap and Age Median Weekly Earnings, by Age and Gender, 2013 Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Survey The pay gap is narrow among younger women and men, but it increases among middle-age workers and older groups.

For example, in this chart, you can see that among young people ages 16 to 34, women are paid around 90 percent of what men are paid.

In the peak earning years of 3564, in contrast, women are paid between 77 percent and 80 percent of what men are paid.

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The Pay Gap and EducationMedian Weekly Earnings, by Level of Education and Gender, 2012 Source: U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population SurveyWhile earnings tend to increase with education level, education does not eliminate the pay gap. The pay gap exists at all levels of education and, in some cases, is larger at higher levels of education.

For example, this chart shows that women with less than a high school diploma were paid 76 percent of what their male peers were paid in 2012, whereas women with masters degrees were paid only 73 percent of what men with masters degrees were paid.8Public Policy The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, signed into law on January 29, 2009

The Paycheck Fairness Act

The Fair Pay Act

Legislation to fix the Wal-Mart v. Dukes ruling

Executive orders, regulations, and enforcement efforts

Thanks in part to the hard work of AAUW Action Network members and our coalition partners, President Barack Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act into law on January 29, 2009. This law allows for a longer time period in which employees can bring legal action for pay discrimination lawsuits.

Other legislative measures that have been pending in Congress for several years would address longstanding discriminatory practices that contribute to the gender-based wage gap. Key among them is the Paycheck Fairness Act (S. 84/H.R. 377), which would expand the Equal Pay Act by requiring employers to prove that wage gaps between women and men doing the same work have a business justification and are truly a result of factors other than sex. It would allow for wage comparisons between employees to determine fair wages and prohibit employer retaliation against workers who inquire about wage practices or disclose their own wages. (This nonretaliation provision would have been particularly helpful to Lilly Ledbetter, because Goodyear prohibited employees from discussing or sharing their wages. This policy delayed her discovery of the discrimination against her by more than a decade.)

The Fair Pay Act (S. 168/H.R. 438) would prohibit wage discrimination based on sex, race, and national origin by requiring employers to provide equal pay for work of equal value, whether or not the jobs are the same. This bill is particularly helpful for women working in women-dominated jobs equivalent in skills, effort, responsibility, and working conditions to jobs dominated by menfor example, a social worker (traditionally female) and a parole officer (traditionally male).

Wal-Mart v. Dukes, a 2011 U.S. Supreme Court decision, severely restricted the ability of workers to fight discrimination together in a class action. Champions in the House and Senate vowed to fix the flawed court decision legislatively. Because partisan gridlock stalled this legislation, President Obama pledged to issue executive orders and additional regulatory guidance and reform, which although limited in scope, would provide additional pay protections for federal contractors and employees.

It was no coincidence that the president signed two AAUW-supported executive orders addressing pay discrimination on Equal Pay Day 2014the day when womens earnings finally catch up to what men earned in the previous year. The first executive order bans federal contractors from retaliating against workers who talk about their salaries or inquire about wage practices. The second executive order requires the U.S. Department of Labor to collect wage data from federal contractors, including the race, sex, and national origin of employees. These two orders send a clear message to companies awarded government contracts that they cannot discriminate with taxpayer money.

The Small Business Administration also issued regulations raising the loan caps for women business owners seeking loans through the Womens Procurement Program, leveling the field for women and men who own competing businesses and are seeking federal contracts.

Federal budgets need to ensure adequate enforcement of all civil rights laws through sufficient funding and staffing of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs, and the various civil rights divisions. The Department of Labors Womens Bureau, the only federal agency devoted to the concerns of women in the workplace, should be fully funded to continue its important work on fair pay issues.

9Conclusion The pay gap is real and pervasive, and it affects all women.

Individuals, employers, and communities need to take action.

For more information and resources, including our one-stop guide on this topic, The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap, visit us online at www.aauw.org. The pay gap is real and pervasive, and it affects all women.

There is no one silver bullet. Rather, individuals, employers, and communities need to take action.

For more information and resources, including AAUWs The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap, visit us online at www.aauw.org. The online version will always have up-to-date information on the pay gap.

Thank you for coming to our presentation. To get informed and involved on pay equity and other issues affecting women and girls, you can join AAUW.1011