by Ellen Bravo
- USA -

The best researchers in the United States gathered recently to solve a long-standing puzzle: why women in the richest country in the world earn so little money. Using sophisticated multiple regression analyses and other scientific tools, the researchers finally came up with the answer.

• As the wage gap fails to improve, women continue to work in the low paying jobs that men don't want. Photograph by Belinda Hankins Miller. •

The Big Boys, those who control power and wealth, will tell you that women’s pay in the U.S. is doing just fine. The gap is narrowing, they proclaim! It’s practically disappeared for young women starting out! Women are faring better than men during this economic downturn! And to the extent that a wage gap exists at all, it’s because of choices women make (trading income for flexibility, opting out of high-paying, high-pressure jobs) or deficiencies they possess (lack of negotiating skills).

Neat little trick, putting it back on women. Problem is, none of it works.

Take the narrowing of the wage gap. Today women overall in the U.S. earn 77 cents for every dollar men make; African-American women earn 72 cents, Latinas 60 cents. That is better than the 59 cents ratio of the late sixties. But half the narrowing of the gap comes from loss of pay for men, particularly men of color. This is hardly what women had in mind by equality. What’s more, the gap is greatest for women with the most education working the longest hours. And the mommy wage gap – the difference between what mothers earn and the pay of everyone else – continues to increase.