In the Lead
Equal Pay Day 2022: Digging Deeper into This Year’s Gender Wage Gap
Equal Pay Day, March 15th, is a day of observance of the persistent gender wage gap in the United States. It marks how far into the new year that women must work to earn what men made in the previous year. Women working full-time earn 83.1 percent of men’s median weekly earnings. But this figure only tells part of the story because it only includes full-time workers. Women are more likely than men to work part-time due to family responsibilities, [...]
Conference on the U.S. Care Infrastructure to Highlight Problems and Possibilities Post-COVID
On March 4 and 5, 2022, the Institute for Women’s Policy Research will host a conference on “The U.S. Care Infrastructure: From Promise to Reality” with the American University Program on Gender Analysis in Economics and the Carework Network. With the fate of the Build Back Better agenda uncertain, and the U.S. care infrastructure in imminent need of overhaul, expert panelists will discuss what is necessary to ensure a comprehensive and equitable care infrastructure both for people who do care [...]
Student Debt Is a Crisis for Women, and Black Women Bear the Greatest Burden
After treading water through two years of pandemic-related student loan forbearance, people with student debt are due to resume payments on May 1, 2022, a shift that will leave many to drown. Student debt is a crisis in the United States, and one that disproportionately impacts women and people of color. Achieving economic mobility—or even just stability—often requires a postsecondary credential. While some unique career paths, like construction trades, offer apprenticeship as a pathway to good jobs, the vast majority [...]
Pregnancy Accommodations Can Help Tackle Skill Shortages, Retain Talent in the Trades
Over four decades after the passage of the Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978, many pregnant workers still experience discrimination and struggle to get reasonable accommodations that would allow them to maintain employment during their pregnancies. New research from IWPR highlights how a lack of pregnancy accommodations harms employers, the economy, and workers’ economic security. IWPR’s survey of tradeswomen shows how a lack of pregnancy accommodations is a factor that pushes workers out of construction jobs with family-sustaining wages and benefits. [...]
The States Making Strides to Close the Gender Wage Gap
In 2020, women made 83 cents on the dollar compared to men, based on median annual earnings for full-time, year-round work. Compared to White non-Hispanic men, White women made 79 cents on the dollar, Black women 64 cents, and Hispanic or Latina women just 57 cents. Without major policy interventions, these gaps will take decades or even centuries to close. Unless we make a change, Black women aren’t projected to reach equal pay until 2133, and Latinas will have to [...]
Senate Failed Again to Ensure Fair Access to the Ballot Box, Crucial to Addressing Racial and Gender Inequities in Our Society
This week, the US Senate failed again to pass voting rights legislation that would have been crucial to the role of women in society, ensuring more equitable access to the ballot box, especially for black women and women of color. Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR) CEO and President C. Nicole Mason lamented that trivial concerns about procedure factored into the bill’s undoing. “It is sad to see this crucial bill undone by arguments about the filibuster and Senate tradition. [...]
