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What's the price of having two X-chromosomes? More than $400,000 -- and that's only if you're white.
According to a new analysis of the wage gap by the National Women's Law Center, a woman who is starting her career now will earn $430,480 less than her male counterpart over the course of a 40-year career, if the current wage gap persists. For many minorities, the losses are even larger: African American women will earn $877,480 less over those 40 years, Native American women will earn $883,040 less and and Latina women will miss out on a whopping $1,007,080 in lifetime wages.
This latest evidence of the persistent and damaging gender earnings gap comes in advance of Equal Pay Day on April 12, the day that marks how far into the "new year" that women would have to work in order to match what their male counterparts made in the prior year. "Women shouldn’t have to work nearly 51 years to make what a man makes in 40 years,” Emily Martin, NWLC's general counsel and vice president for workplace justice, said in a statement accompanying the research.
In a phone interview Tuesday afternoon, Martin added that the magnitude of the numbers being presented puts a price tag on the many different factors driving wage inequality -- a price tag that will, perhaps, inspire solutions for each of those factors.
The analysis didn't just look at national wage data; it broke down the wage gap state-by-state, too:
Louisiana is the worst state for women overall; there, women face a $671,840 earnings gap. The best state is Florida: women there earn "just" $248,120 less than their male counterparts.
The state-by-state data reveal an even darker picture for minorities. In California, Native American women face a lifetime earnings gap of nearly $1.4 million, more than in any other state. African American and Latina women fare worst in Washington D.C. (a city that, for the purposes of this study, was treated like a state), where African American women face a nearly-$1.6 million lifetime earnings deficit and Latinas will lose out on a whopping $1.78 million over a 40-year career. And while the overall wage gap for Asian women is closer to that of women overall ($365,440 compared to the $430,480 aggregate figure), Asian American women earn nearly $1.2 million less than white non-Hispanic men in Alaska.
When asked what accounted for such varying results state by state, Martin said, "I don’t think we have a perfect answer to that, but we have some guesses. In general, I think you’ll see bigger wage gaps in states that have more occupational segregation. If we look at states with some of the largest wage gaps – West Virginia, North Dakota, Wyoming, Louisiana – those are states that have either a lot of mining or oil and gas operations, jobs that are pretty high paid and almost all men's jobs, and I suspect that’s what we see driving the wage gap."
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Occupational segregation could account for some of the largest income disparities in the country, like in California and D.C. where top-earning occupations (like, for instance, venture capital) have very low levels of female representation, especially among the top ranks. Conversely, industries that are low-paying and whose ranks are over-represented by women and minorities (like, for instance, domestic work) also play into the results.
Martin also noted that states with lower minimum wages have large wage gaps than states that have higher minimum wages, because women comprise two-thirds of who gets paid minimum wage.
The NWLC analysis did not control for education, though older studies -- like this 2014 Harvard Business Review analysis -- have shown that education is not quite the "great equalizer," and that gender matters most when it comes to lifetime earnings.
Considering the litany of data showing just how great of a disadvantage from which so many women are operating -- to say nothing of the high-profile struggles of some of America's most prominent executives, actresses and even athletes -- a world in which equal pay for equal work seems closer to a fantasy than reality. But, Martin said, progress is possible.
"It requires multiple policy responses. Part of what we’re pushing for is the strengthening of equal pay laws," she said. "It is not hopeless."
To see how the wage gap breaks down according to each profession, click through here:
