Equal Pay Initiatives

The U.S. Department of Labor supports initiatives to lessen gender and racial pay disparities in the workforce. Women who work full-time are paid an average of 83.7 percent as much as men. The inequity is even greater for Black and Hispanic women. There is a significant gender wage gap at every level of education, even though on average women have more years of schooling than men. The DOL posits that women must complete one additional degree in order to be paid the same wage as a man with less education. Moreover, the wage gap for older women workers is larger than for younger women workers, and older Black and Hispanic women have the most pay disparity.

To address gender and racial disparities in the workplace, the DOL has the following initiatives:

• Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs’ Mega Construction Project Program to foster equal opportunity in the construction trades workforce;
• Employment and Training Administration’s cooperative agreement to support TradesFutures, the National Urban League and their community partners to develop a strategy to increase the number of participants from underrepresented populations in Registered Apprenticeships;
• Publication by the Women’s Bureau of a brief on the causes of the gender wage gap and salary history bans legislation; and
• Good Jobs Initiative to provide tools with practical strategies to increase equal employment opportunities on infrastructure projects.