Fact check: Do men get payed more than women and what jobs is there a pay gap not including blue collar jobs

1. Why the Numbers Differ — Measurement Matters and Changes the Story

Different studies emphasize distinct measures, producing different headlines: national median comparisons show a broad 81¢ on the dollar figure for full-time, year-round workers in 2024, while within-job comparisons that control for role and qualifications can find a smaller gap, roughly 2.7%, between men and women performing the same job ^{[1] [3]}. The $26,000 figure comes from comparing men and women with similar tertiary education within specific industries like banking and finance, an uncontrolled gap that mixes occupation, seniority, and sector concentration effects ^[2]. These methodological choices create legitimate but different narratives about pay equity.

2. Where the Gap Looks Biggest — High-Paid Professional Fields Stand Out

Sector-level analyses repeatedly flag banking and finance as places where women with tertiary degrees earn dramatically less than men — reported as roughly $26k on average in one recent study — and professional degrees like MBAs show large uncontrolled disparities in some datasets ^{[2] [4]}. Other professional occupations often show persistent gaps even after accounting for education, with finance managers, lawyers, and some managerial roles appearing in multiple reports as areas of concern. The pattern indicates that higher-paying professional fields can yield some of the largest dollar-value gaps, reflecting both pay scales and differences in representation at senior levels ^{[2] [4]}.

3. What Happens When You Control for Job and Qualifications — The Gap Narrows but Doesn’t Vanish

When researchers compare men and women in the same job with similar qualifications, the measured gap shrinks: PayScale’s analysis found women make about 2.7% less than comparable men, demonstrating that part of the headline gap is explained by occupational sorting, experience, and hours worked ^[3]. Yet the persistence of a gap even under like-for-like comparisons points to residual disparities—which may reflect negotiation, discrimination, promotion differences, or unmeasured job-task differences. This distinction between uncontrolled and controlled gaps is central to policy and corporate responses.

4. Race and Education Layers — Who Loses More Money?

The Census-based findings show the broad 81¢ figure masks deeper disparities: Black women and Latinas faced substantially larger shortfalls compared with white non-Hispanic men, reported as 65¢ and 58¢, respectively, in the cited analysis ^[1]. Education interacts with gender: some studies indicate women with higher degrees still face large uncontrolled gaps—postgraduate women in certain industries saw an average shortfall around $12,000, compounding equity concerns ^[2]. These layered gaps emphasize that intersectional factors like race and education level matter for outcomes.

5. Female-Dominated Fields Are Not Immune — Pay Falls as Women Dominate Some Jobs

Evidence suggests that even female-dominated sectors often maintain pay gaps and can experience wage declines as they feminize, with reporting noting pay differences in roles such as nurses, teachers, and clerical positions, and decline in job valuation when women become the majority ^{[5] [6]}. UK data referenced in the analyses finds pay gaps persist across many female-majority occupations, including office managers and clerical assistants, underscoring that domination by women alone does not guarantee pay parity and may correlate with undervaluation of work ^[6].

6. Trends Over Time — The Gap Widened Recently, Triggering Alarm

Recent Census data indicate the gender pay gap widened for two consecutive years through 2024, driven in part by rising men’s wages while women’s median earnings stagnated, prompting concern among researchers and advocates ^[1]. This reversal of long-term convergence trends suggests that economic conditions, labor-market sorting, and sectoral shifts during and after the pandemic may have produced differential recoveries. The timing and drivers are crucial because a widening trend increases the urgency of targeted policy responses.

7. Competing Explanations and Policy Implications — What the Data Don’t Fully Resolve

Analyses offer competing but complementary explanations: occupational segregation, experience and interruption patterns, undervaluation of women’s work, and potential discrimination are all cited as contributors ^{[5] [3]}. Because metrics vary, policy choices differ: tackling large uncontrolled gaps calls for systemic measures like pay transparency and promotion equity, while small controlled gaps point toward targeted hiring and negotiation supports. The evidence supports a multi-pronged approach rather than a single fix ^{[4] [5]}.

8. Bottom Line — A Complex, Persistent Problem That Varies by Job and Measure

Across the sources, the unambiguous fact is that women earn less than men overall, but the magnitude ranges from modest when comparing identical roles to large in sectoral dollar terms—up to $26k in finance for tertiary-educated workers—while demographic subgroups fare worse ^{[3] [2] [1]}. Interpreting these numbers requires attention to methodology, industry composition, and intersectional impacts; policymakers and employers should use both controlled and uncontrolled metrics to design responses that address both occupational sorting and residual pay differentials ^{[2] [5]}.