美国国家公共电台 NPR--It's Equal Pay Day. The gender pay gap has hardly budged in 20 years. What gives?

It's Equal Pay Day. The gender¹ pay gap has hardly budged² in 20 years. What gives?

Transcript³

Tuesday is Equal Pay Day: March 14th represents how far into the year women have had to work to catch up to what their male colleagues earned the previous year.

In other words, women have to work nearly 15 months to earn what men make in 12 months.

82 cents on the dollar, and less for women of color

This is usually referred to as the gender pay gap. Here are the numbers:

- Women earn about 82 cents for every dollar a man earns

- For Black women, it's about 65 cents

- For Latina women, it's about 60 cents

Those gaps widen when comparing what women of color earn to the salaries of White men. These numbers have basically not budged in 20 years. That's particularly strange because so many other things have changed:

- More women now graduate from college than men

- More women graduate from law school than men

- Medical school graduates are roughly half women

That should be seen as progress. So why hasn't the pay gap improved too?

Francine Blau, an economist⁴ at Cornell who has been studying the gender pay gap for decades, calls this the $64,000 question. "Although if you adjust for inflation, it's probably in the millions by now," she jokes.

The childcare conundrum⁵

Blau says one of the biggest factors here is childcare. Many women shy away from really demanding positions or work only part time because they need time and flexibility⁶ to care for their kids.

"Women will choose jobs or switch to occupations or companies that are more family friendly," she explains. "But a lot of times those jobs will pay less."

Other women leave the workforce⁷ entirely⁸. For every woman at a senior management level who gets promoted, two women leave their jobs, most citing childcare as a major reason.

The "unexplained pay gap"

Even if you account for things like women taking more flexible jobs, working fewer hours, taking time off for childcare, etc., paychecks between the sexes still aren't square. Blau and her research partner Lawrence Kahn controlled for "everything we could find reliable data on" and found that women still earn about 8% less than their male colleagues for the same job.

"It's what we call the 'unexplained pay gap,'" says Blau, then laughs. "Or, you could just call it discrimination."

Mend the gap?

One way women could narrow the unexplained pay gap is, of course, to negotiate for higher salaries. But Blau points out that women are likely to experience backlash when they ask for more money. And it can be hard to know how much their male colleagues make and, therefore, what to ask for.

That is changing: a handful of states now require salary ranges be included in job postings.

Blau says that information can be a game changer at work for women and other marginalized groups: "They can get a real sense of, 'Oh, this is the bottom of the range and this is the top of the range. What's reasonable to ask for?'"

A pay raise, if the data is any indication.

1 gender   

n.（生理上的）性，（名词、代词等的）性

参考例句：

• French differs from English in having gender for all nouns.法语不同于英语，所有的名词都有性。
• Women are sometimes denied opportunities solely because of their gender.妇女有时仅仅因为性别而无法获得种种机会。

2 budged   

v.（使）稍微移动( budge的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）改变主意，（使）让步

参考例句：

• Old Bosc had never budged an inch--he was totally indifferent. 老包斯克一直连动也没有动，他全然无所谓。 来自辞典例句
• Nobody budged you an inch. 别人一丁点儿都算计不了你。 来自辞典例句

3 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

4 economist   

n.经济学家，经济专家，节俭的人

参考例句：

• He cast a professional economist's eyes on the problem.他以经济学行家的眼光审视这个问题。
• He's an economist who thinks he knows all the answers.他是个经济学家，自以为什么都懂。

5 conundrum   

n.谜语；难题

参考例句：

• Let me give you some history about a conundrum.让我给你们一些关于谜题的历史。
• Scientists had focused on two explanations to solve this conundrum.科学家已锁定两种解释来解开这个难题。

6 flexibility   

n.柔韧性，弹性，（光的）折射性，灵活性

参考例句：

• Her great strength lies in her flexibility.她的优势在于她灵活变通。
• The flexibility of a man's muscles will lessen as he becomes old.人老了肌肉的柔韧性将降低。

7 workforce   

n.劳动大军，劳动力

参考例句：

• A large part of the workforce is employed in agriculture.劳动人口中一大部分受雇于农业。
• A quarter of the local workforce is unemployed.本地劳动力中有四分之一失业。

8 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。