Women in Mass. made 81 percent of men’s salaries in 2013



Women in Mass. made 81 percent of men’s salaries in 2013

Here’s the good news: The median weekly earnings of full-time workers in Massachusetts in 2013 was higher than in any other state in the country, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Tuesday.

The not-so-good news? Women in the state made $900 a week, or only 81.2 percent of the $1,109 that men made.

The kind-of-good news is that the most recent ratio of women’s to men’s earnings was the highest its been in Massachusetts since state data became available in 1997. The low point was in 2007, when women earned just 74.8 percent of men’s salaries. In Vermont, women make 91.3 percent of men’s wages — the smallest gender wage gap in the country.

Nationwide, women earn $706 per week, or 82.1 percent of men’s $860 median wage. The data does not control for factors that affect earnings such as occupation, education, and experience, although studies have shown that accounting for these differences lessens but does not eliminate the wage gap.

Efforts are underway in Massachusetts to address the gender wage gap, including a bill that would prohibit employers from seeking job candidates’ salary histories and require companies to disclose the pay of advertised positions. In Boston, 60 companies have pledged to put measures in place to equalize salaries and submit salary data to monitor their progress.


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