The earnings gap between American women and men narrowed to the smallest on record in 2023, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday.
Median weekly earnings for women were $1,031 last year, or 83.8% of the typical amount that men were paid, according to the BLS data.
Gender Earnings Ratio
Women's median weekly earnings as a share of men's
Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
The gender pay gap varied widely by race and ethnicity. Black women earned close to 94% of Black men’s pay, while the equivalent figure for White women and men was 84.1%, and for Asian women and men 78.3%.
Overall, median weekly earnings among the nation’s 121.3 million full-time wage and salary workers were $1,142 last quarter — an increase of 5.4% from a year earlier without adjustment for inflation.
Full-time workers age 25 and over without a high-school diploma had median weekly earnings of $713, compared with $917 for high-school graduates and $1,608 for those holding at least a bachelor’s degree, according to the BLS. Among college graduates with advanced degrees, the highest-earning 10% of male workers made at least $4,623 per week, compared with $3,443 for women in the equivalent group.