'Disturbing' Gender-Based Wage Gap Data Renews Call For Change
Jennie Lee Colosi, president of E.T. & L. Corp. of Stow, could hardly believe a recent report that showed the wage gap between men and women in every congressional district.
“It really baffles me,” Colosi said.
As president of a construction firm, a male-dominated field, you might think Colosi encounters evidence of income inequality between men and women all the time. But she doesn't. She said employees in the field are union workers, so they're paid prevailing wages established by the state.
On the office side, Colosi said male and female employees are paid equally for equal work, based on the Equal Pay Act of 1963. But, she said, perhaps it's time for fresh regulation if income disparities are so prevalent.
An analysis of U.S. Census data, released by the National Partnership for Women & Families in September, showed a disparity in pay between men and women throughout most of the United States, and the results seemed to fly in the face of milestones women have achieved in the workplace in recent decades.
The analysis was the first of its kind, with prior reports detailing wage gaps at the state level only. Officials from the National Partnership for Women & Families called the finding that men earn more than women in full-time jobs in 97 percent of congressional districts “disturbing.”
Wage Gaps By District
Women living in Massachusetts' 5th district, centered in the Merrimack Valley and which includes the northeast corner of Central Massachusetts, experience the largest pay disparity in the state, earning an average of 73 percent of the average annual income for men. The 2nd and 3rd districts, which include Southern Worcester County and the city of Worcester, respectively, trailed closely at 75 percent, and the 1st District, which includes North Central Massachusetts, followed at 78 percent.
The Equal Pay Act has not been updated since its passage. Sarah Crawford, director of workplace fairness at the National Partnership for Women and Families, said the organization and other advocates for women in the workplace are working to change that.
“It is a priority issue and it has fairly widespread support in Congress,” Crawford said.
She was referring to the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill aimed at ensuring women are paid the same as their male counterparts. The House of Representatives approved it, but it failed to pass muster in the Senate, with all 47 Republican senators voting against it.
Opponents of the Paycheck Fairness Act said it could hinder small business, and claimed it wasn't necessary because of the existing laws that deal with the issue.
But Crawford said those laws don't seem to be doing the job. She said she was a little surprised that there wasn't more wage-gap variation based on industry or region. She noted that women earned more than men in just 12 of the 435 congressional districts across the country.
The industry with the smallest pay gap between men and women is construction, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. It may seem odd at first glance, but, like Colosi of E.T. & L. Corp., Crawford noted that those workers are paid prevailing wage set by state law.
What's driving the wage gap is far from clear, according to Crawford. The analysis released in September simply compared the pay of men and women working full-time jobs, and did not delve into credentials, educational background and industry trends.
Deep-Rooted Bias?
“We have seen studies that try to figure out what explains pay differences,” Crawford said. “Often with these studies, there is a significant portion of the pay gap that just cannot be explained.”
Some seem to suggest deep-rooted psychological bias against women in the workplace, including one published by the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. In it, a nationwide sample of biology, chemistry and physics professors evaluated applications materials from undergraduate students applying for a science laboratory manager position. Results indicated that both male and female professors found the female students less competent than their male counterparts. They also offered them starting salaries of about $3,500 less than those offered to males.
Re-evaluating Payroll Practices
In light of this evidence, and the new wage gap data, Crawford said she hopes the Paycheck Fairness Act will find more support from the public and that the next Congress will enact it.
And, she hopes companies will take a good look at their own practices.
Asked whether her company has a written policy aimed at avoiding such pay disparities, Susan Mailman, CEO of Coghlin Electrical Contractors Inc. & Coghlin Network Services of Worcester, said ensuring equal pay is not “policy driven.” But as a female CEO, she feels she's more in tune with the issue than her male counterparts at other companies may be.
Mailman finds it interesting that far fewer women run Fortune 500 companies, and she thinks it's time federal laws regarding equal pay are updated.
“You would have expected women in this juncture, in 2012, might have been in a better place by now,” Mailman said.
Image credit: FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
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