Idaho and the Wage Gap

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Women workers, recording and moving ingots in 1943

The Government Accountability Office has released a new report on the persistent wage gap between working men and women.  Specifically, the report considers workers who have less education and earn lower wages.  Among its findings: “Even when less-educated women and men were in the same broad industry or occupation category, these women’s average hourly wage was lower than men’s.”

As for the wage gap on the whole, The New York Times sums it up:

“Adjusted for factors that could affect pay, like age, race, education, number of children in the household and part-time status, women earn 86 cents for every $1 earned by men. That’s up from 81 cents in 2000.”

According to the most recent (non-adjusted) numbers available from the Idaho Department of Labor, Idaho’s wage gap is considerable.  From the fourth quarter of 2009 through the third quarter of 2010, working Idaho women earned not quite 62% of the amount earned by working Idaho men.

The department’s most recent analysis of the wage gap is available here.