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March 26 is Equal Pay Day. The date isn't a celebration — it's a marker. It represents how far into the new year women must work just to match what men earned in the previous year alone. That's roughly three extra months of work to close a gap that, frankly, should no longer exist.
And here's the troubling part: it's getting wider, not narrower.
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, women working full-time in 2024 earned 81 cents for every dollar earned by men — down from 83 cents the year before. In real terms, that's median annual earnings of $57,520 for women versus $71,090 for men. Two consecutive years of the gap widening. That's not a blip. That's a trend worth paying attention to.
Researchers have long pointed to familiar explanations — caregiving responsibilities, occupational choices, negotiation differences, and outright discrimination. But three new studies add important nuance to that picture, and the findings have real implications for anyone shaping workplace policy.
Working Together Costs Women Money
The first study, published in the journal Human Resource Management, uncovered a striking pattern: men are financially rewarded for working in all-male groups, while women are actually penalized for working in all-female ones.
Researchers examined doctors within an HMO, controlling for degrees, specialties, and patient satisfaction. The result? Men in all-male groups out-earned men working solo. Women in all-female groups earned less than women working solo. The grouping helped men and hurt women.
Why? Lead researcher Mallory Decker, a PhD student at the University of Colorado Boulder, puts it plainly: when women work together, others often assume they're organizing to challenge the status quo — even when they're not. That perceived threat leads decision-makers to undervalue and underpay all-women teams, while all-men groups are seen as normal and productive.
This isn't a quirk. It's bias baked into how organizations assign value — and it's something policy can directly address through pay audits and transparent compensation structures.
Women Take on More Work, Not Less Pay
A second study, currently posted on SSRN, adds another layer. In an online experiment, participants were offered two kinds of unfair deals: lower pay than a colleague for the same work, or the same pay but a heavier workload.
Women consistently rejected lower pay — but were more willing to accept the extra work. Men responded similarly in both scenarios.
The researchers suggest this reflects something deeply ingrained: women are accustomed to absorbing disproportionate labor, particularly at home, so workplace overload feels more familiar than financial shortchanging. The problem is that taking on more work quietly erodes the time and energy women can dedicate to their core responsibilities, which can, over time, suppress their earnings and advancement.
For policymakers, this points to the importance of addressing workload equity alongside pay equity. The two are more connected than they might appear.
Children Remain the Single Biggest Driver of the Gap
The third study may be the most consequential. Economists at the London School of Economics studied women diagnosed with MRKH syndrome — a congenital condition in which women are born without a uterus. These women typically know from adolescence that they won't have biological children, making them a rare and valuable comparison group.
The findings were striking. In their twenties, women with MRKH had labor market outcomes nearly identical to those of other women. But by their thirties and forties, they were earning on par with men. The researchers conclude that nearly the entire gender earnings gap at prime working ages can be traced back to the impact of children on women's careers.
Importantly, this wasn't about women anticipating motherhood and making different career choices beforehand. Women with MRKH chose similar occupations and had only slightly more education than their peers. The gap, the researchers argue, is driven by what happens after children arrive — not before.
This is a direct argument for stronger childcare infrastructure, more equitable parental leave, and workplace flexibility policies that don't quietly punish mothers for showing up differently than fathers.
These three studies point to the same uncomfortable truth: the gender pay gap isn't a product of individual choices or personal failings. It's the result of systemic forces — biases about women who work together, invisible labor that goes uncompensated, and a caregiving burden that falls disproportionately on mothers.
The gap is widening. The evidence on what's driving it is clearer than ever. What's needed now is the policy will to act on it.