Gender wage gap narrows to smallest on record

The earnings gap between American women and men narrowed to the smallest on record in 2023, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Thursday. Median weekly earnings for women were $1,031 last year, or 83.8 percent of the typical amount that men were paid, according to the BLS data. The gender pay gap varied widely by race and ethnicity. Black women earned close to 94 percent of Black men’s pay, while the equivalent figure for white women and men was 84.1 percent, and for Asian women and men 78.3 percent. Overall, median weekly earnings among the nation’s 121.3 million full-time wage and salary workers were $1,142 last quarter — an increase of 5.4 percent from a year earlier without adjustment for inflation.