By Guy Raz (Host)
“Next, information asymmetry, pay secrecy, makes it easier to ignore the discrimination that’s already present in the market today. In a 2011 report from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, the gender wage gap between men and women was 23 percent. This is where that 77 cents on the dollar comes from. But in the federal government, where salaries are pinned to certain levels and everybody knows what those levels are, the gender wage gap shrinks to 11 percent. And this is before controlling for any of the factors that economists argue over whether or not to control for. If we really want to close the gender wage gap, maybe we should start by opening up the payroll.”
