Author Archives: waworkfam

Gag rules — company policies that prohibit employees from discussing their salaries with each other — thrive in workplaces across the country. In a report updated this year, the Institute for Women’s Policy Research found that about half of American employees in all sectors are either explicitly prohibited or strongly discouraged from discussing pay withContinue reading “When the Boss Says, ‘Don’t Tell Your Coworkers How Much You Get Paid’”

A new report, “Closing the Pay Gap and Beyond,” finds that in 1979, median hourly earnings for women were 62.7 percent of men’s hourly wages. That gap narrowed in the two decades that followed, but since 2000 it has hovered in the 80 percent rage. In 2014, women’s median hourly earnings were 82.9 percent ofContinue reading “Report: Gender Wage Gap Shrinks Because Men Earn Less”

We’re all aware of the statistic that American working women are paid 79 cents for every dollar that working men make. There’s a reason this disparity is so well-known — it’s a powerful indicator of the value, monetarily and socially, placed on men over women. But this glimpse of the pay gap only tells a portionContinue reading “We can’t talk about the pay gap without talking about race”