Among full-time, year-round workers, women in the U.S. are typically paid only 84 cents for every dollar paid to men. This gap in earnings translates into $9,954 less per year in median earnings, leaving women and their families shortchanged.
The loss of 16 cents on the dollar adds up over a month, a year, and a lifetime. Based on this wage gap, women would lose $398,160 over the course of a 40-year career. For Latinas compared to white, non-Hispanic men the career losses mount to $1,188,960, for Native women, the losses are $1,151,880, and for Black women the losses are $907,680. If action isn’t taken to close the wage gap, a woman just starting her career today stands to lose hundreds of thousands of dollars – or even more than $1 million depending on her race/ethnicity – over the course of her career, undercutting her ability to provide for herself and her family, as well as her retirement security.
Assuming a woman and her male counterpart begin working full time, year round at age 20, the wage gap means a woman would have to work until she is 68 to be paid what a man has been paid by age 60. This lifetime gap makes it impossible for Black, Latina, and Native women to ever catch up unless they worked full time, year round to age 80 or 90, beyond their life expectancies.
