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Toast-in-cheek to wage gap
It took the average woman until Tuesday to earn what her male counterpart made in '06.
By Christina Rexrode, Times Staff Writer
Published April 26, 2007
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Leslie Wilson hugs Kristin Guendthardt, in red, of the Pinellas chapter of Business and Professional Women as they mark Equal Pay Day with an "unhappy hour" on Tuesday in St. Petersburg. "Why should our gender cause us to be paid less?" Wilson asks.
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[Times photo: John Pendygraft]
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U.S. women's wages
still lag behind men's
Women earn about 77 cents for every dollar that men earn, according to census data. Women in Florida fare a bit better at 82 cents. |
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By occupation, women's median earnings as a percentage of men's:
| Management |
74.2 |
| Business and finances |
72.0 |
| Architecture/engineering |
83.4 |
| Social services |
92.1 |
| Law |
49.5 |
| Education |
76.0 |
| Health care support |
88.9 |
| Food preparation/service |
80.0 |
| Sales |
64.6 |
| Construction |
89.7 |
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"Celebration" isn't exactly the right word. On Tuesday, businesswomen gathered across the country to observe Equal Pay Day, the day that the average American woman earns the same amount that her male counterpart earned in the previous year. To reach the average man's 2006 earnings, the average woman had to work an extra three months and 17 days. At an Unhappy Hour hosted by the Pinellas chapter of Business and Professional Women in St. Petersburg, about 75 attendees commiserated over the glum statistics. According to the most recent census data, women earn about 77 cents for every dollar that men earn. Women in Florida, however, fare better than the national average, earning about 82 cents for every dollar that men earn. "Why should our gender cause us to be paid less?" asked Leslie Wilson, who attended Tuesday's Unhappy Hour. Wilson, vice president of retirement services for SunTrust Bank in Tampa, described the event at A Taste for Wine as "a strength-building process." The BPW estimates that the wage gap closes by about one-third of a penny each year. True to that assessment, Equal Pay Day fell one day earlier this year than it did last year.
[Last modified April 25, 2007, 22:55:53]
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