Facts on Working Women: Earnings Differences between Women and Men

摘要

When the authors talk of comparing women's earnings with men's earnings, theyfind that no matter how they measure them, women's earnings are below those received by men. Very often men's earnings are used as the 'yardstick' to measure women's, and they say women's earnings are a percentage of men's. The earnings gap is the difference between this percentage ratio of women's earnings to those of men and 100 percent. In 1988 for those receiving hourly rates, women's median hourly earnings were 74 percent of men's; for full-time wage and salary workers, women's median weekly earnings were 70 percent of men's; and median annual earnings for women were 66 percent of men's annual earnings. The earnings gap, then, for hourly earnings is 26 percent; for weekly earnings, 30 percent; and for annual earnings, 34 percent. All three measures are developed from Current Population Survey (household survey) data and released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).