Gender Equality
  • 5.1.1 Whether or not legal frameworks are in place to promote, enforce and monitor equality and non‑discrimination on the basis of sex
  • 5.1.2 Women’s earnings as a percentage of men’s earning
  • 5.2.1 Proportion of ever-partnered women and girls aged 15 years and older subjected to physical, sexual or psychological violence by a current or former intimate partner in the previous 12 months, by form of violence and by age
  • 5.2.2 Proportion of women and girls aged 15 years and older subjected to sexual violence by persons other than an intimate partner in the previous 12 months, by age and place of occurrence
  • 5.3.1 Proportion of women aged 20–24 years who were married or in a union before age 15 and before age 18
  • 5.3.2 Proportion of girls and women aged 15–49 years who have undergone female genital mutilation/cutting, by age
  • 5.4.1 Proportion of time spent on unpaid domestic and care work, by sex, age and location
  • 5.5.1 Proportion of seats held by women in (a) national parliaments and (b) local governments
  • 5.5.2 Proportion of women in managerial positions
  • 5.6.1 Proportion of women aged 15–49 years who make their own informed decisions regarding sexual relations, contraceptive use and reproductive health care
  • 5.6.2 Number of countries with laws and regulations that guarantee full and equal access to women and men aged 15 years and older to sexual and reproductive health care, information and education
  • 5.a.1 (a) Proportion of total agricultural population with ownership or secure rights over agricultural land, by sex; and (b) share of women among owners or rights-bearers of agricultural land, by type of tenure
  • 5.a.2 Proportion of countries where the legal framework (including customary law) guarantees women’s equal rights to land ownership and/or control
  • 5.b.1 Proportion of individuals who own a mobile telephone, by sex
  • 5.c.1 Proportion of countries with systems to track and make public allocations for gender equality and women’s empowerment

    • 5.1.2 Women’s earnings as a percentage of men’s earning

     

    In an analysis by the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC), white non-Hispanic women in the US made $0.79 for every dollar white non-Hispanic men made in 2020. Nationally, Black women earned $0.63 for every dollar white non-Hispanic men made. The disparity in the wage gap is especially stark in DC where white non-Hispanic women earned$0.81 while Black women earned only $0.49. In the National Women’s Law Center (NWLC) ranked wage gap comparison by state, DC was ranked 9th for white non-Hispanic women and 46th for Black women followed only by Louisiana (the four remaining states not included due to small sample sizes). 

    Discussing the wage gap exclusively in terms of cents on the dollar can conceal the gravity of the gap. For example, in 2018, the Center for American Progress estimated the earnings gap for white women working full-time year round for 40 years to be $527,440. For Black women that figure is $941,600 and for Hispanic or Latino women the estimated earnings gap is $1,121,440. These economic losses balloon and echo through generations of women of color who lost opportunities to invest in their education, their child’s education, or a home. 

    Women disproportionately experienced economic shock with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic as the unemployment rate for women rose significantly more than it did for men, especially in low-paying sectors. Women were also more likely to be responsible for increased caregiving demands when schools and day care facilities closed but Black and Latina women were less likely to have the option to work from home. 

    Despite women surpassing men in educational attainment and outnumbering the share of male graduates in each possible post-secondary award, the pay gap has persisted. Occupational differences, or occupational segregation offer one account for the gender pay gap whereby gendered expectations channel men and women into specific industries. Occupations with historically female work forces typically have lower pay and fewer benefits such as home health care work and child care work and extends also to nonprofit and public sector career paths as popular bachelor’s degrees among women include healthcare, social science, history, and education. 

    This offers a partial explanation for why the pay gap grows in graduate school as women are concentrated in lower paying master’s degree fields like counseling and education. Social and cultural norms play a role in steering women into these fields while simultaneously devaluing what is considered “women’s work.” However, even in higher paying male dominated sectors, women still earn less.

    Women are also more likely to be driven out of the workforce or work fewer hours to attend to unpaid obligations like caregiving resulting in fewer hours worked and less cumulative experience. Scientists have attempted to control for all known measurable causes of the pay gap but still find women only earn 92% of what men earn for the same job, leaving discrimination the likely culprit. Furthermore, discrimination can follow women throughout their career if previous salary is used in decisions on compensation.