This is the most commonly cited figure. The only data available to compare the wage gap by race is 1999 annual weekly earnings from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and using that measure, women working full-time throughout the year earn 77 for every dollar earned by men. African-Americans earn 78 and Latinos only 67 for every dollar paid to their white counterparts. The wage gap is the result of both discrimination and the concentration of women and people of color in a narrow range of jobs that are underpaid because of who holds them. More than half of all women workers hold sales, clerical and service jobs.
Studies show that the more women or people of color dominate an occupation, the less it pays.
But the wage gap also is seen across sectors, regardless of occupation or title. Part of the wage gap results from differences in education, experience or time in the workforce. The wage gap has narrowed by about ten percentage points during the last seventeen years, ranging from 62 percent in 1982 to 72 percent in 1999. Since 1973 however, approximately 60 percent of the change in the wage gap is due to the fall in men's real earnings. About 40 percent of the change in the wage gap is due to the increase in women's wages.