The Texas employee wage gap is relatively narrow compared with national figures, which account for both private and public sector jobs.
“Occupation and sector together account for more than half of the gender wage gap,” said Ariane Hegewisch, the lead employment and earnings researcher for the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, a Washington nonprofit that advocates for higher pay for women.
After reviewing The News ’ findings, Hegewisch called the widening pay gap “a Texas peculiarity” because, nationally, the gender pay gap is narrowing — if only at a snail’s pace.
Among the many complications and nuances that plague researchers who study pay equity is that studies indicate women tend to fill lower-paying jobs for a variety of reasons.
“If you have a lot of white men in the highest-paid jobs in the public sector and you have a lot of women of color being care workers, teachers assistants, those types of jobs, you will get a wage gap,” Hegewisch said.
