Equal Pay for Women Can Cut Poverty in Half, Boost Wages Significantly, AND Grow the Economy. Can Any Other Policy Lever Do That?

Every September, the U.S. Census Bureau releases its update on income and poverty in the United States. I — along with many other economists, policy wonks, data geeks, and others — impatiently refresh the Census.gov website to learn whether there has been any improvement in men’s and women’s earnings, the wage gap, or the poverty rate. In recent years, the significance of each release has been characterized by its insignificance: since 2007, there has not been a statistically significant narrowing of the gender wage gap, and between 2013 and 2014, there was not a statistically significant difference in the poverty rate. Moreover, adjusted for inflation, the last ten years have seen virtually no increase in women’s earnings, so women are now experiencing what men have experienced for more than three decades — the failure of real wages to grow.

Heidi Hartmann

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