- In a new study, the Pew Research Center analyzed the
pay gap for young workers in 250 metro areas. - In 22 metros, young women made as much, if not more, than their male peers.
Some of America's youngest female workers are making more money than men the same age — and it could make the gender pay gap less extreme in the future.
In a new study, the Pew Research Center examined what the pay gap looks like for workers between 16 and 29 years old who work full-time, year-round.
Women's earnings to men's vary throughout the country by metro area based on the analysis from Pew:
There are some cities where women in this age group actually have median annual earnings higher than men's median annual earnings, based on Pew's analysis of individual-level data from the Census Bureau's 2015-2019 American Community Survey for 250 metros. That includes Wenatchee, Washington, where women earn 20% more than their male peers, the highest percentage for areas included in the analysis. Morgantown, West Virginia follows Wenatchee, with young women making 14% more than their male peers.
Richmond, Virginia, is one of the six metros part of the analysis where women under 30 had the same median annual earnings as men. There were 22 metro areas where there is either no earnings gap or where women make more than their fellow male peers in this age cohort. Some of those cities are among the largest in the country, according to Richard Fry, the report's author, like New York, where women earn 102% what men make.
Here are all the places part of the analysis where women earned at least as much as what men earned:
Women's earnings keeping pace with men at this age isn't unheard of, according to Fry.
"There's evidence that the pay gap tends to be narrowest early in women's careers," Fry said. "Then it sort of widens as they age," because women may pay a motherhood penalty as they "take on family responsibilities."
But the newest generation of workers have a few things that set them apart — and they might just chip away at the pay gap in the long term.
"Given the differences in their current labor market position, as well as their education levels relative to men, it may be indeed a different story for this group of young women," Fry said.
Gen Z, the oldest of whom are 25, is the most racially diverse generation. According to Pew, they're set to be the most educated generation yet. Pew has found that, as of 2019, nearly 40% of adults ages 25 to 34 were unmarried, a big spike from decades past. There's also a gender gap in education: Women are now outpacing men in college enrollment, and, among adults who were ages 25 to 34 in 2021, women were much more likely to graduate college than men. That could partially explain why those younger female workers are now earning more.
But the pay gap is still here
While these earnings may buck the longstanding trend of women earning less, the pay gap is still persistent.
"From a regional perspective, metropolitan areas in the Midwest tend to have wider gender wage gaps among young workers," the author of the report wrote. "Young women working full time, year-round in Midwestern metros earn about 90% of their male counterparts."
It's no secret that women are, on the whole, paid less than men. March 15 was Equal Pay Day, which marks how many more days women would have to work to earn what men made in 2021. The pay gap is even wider for women of color. For instance, Black women earn 64% of what non-Hispanic white men earn.
Overall, the pay gap is 83 cents for every dollar men make according to 2020 data. Occupational segregation is one reason the pay gap exists but not the only reason.
Young female workers are still being out-earned in some places. Elkhart-Goshen, Indiana is one of them. Women under 30 years old earned a median of just $26,634 annually, or around 67% of what men make. That means the Indiana city has the lowest ratio of female earnings to men among the areas Pew analyzed.