The Institute for Women's Policy Research (IWPR) released a new fact sheet on theoccupational gender wage gap that shows women have lower medianearnings than men in 107 out of 111 occupations, regardless oflevels of education.

The fact sheet, based on an analysis of median weekly wage datafrom the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, is released annually byIWPR to mark Equal Pay Day.

“Even though we are still far from equality, Title VIIlitigation has fueled progress for women in the workplace and classaction has been the key to bringing about greater fairness at work,improving workplaces for all workers—not only for those who broughtthe suit.”

According to the fact sheet, in the lowest paid ten occupationsclose to two-thirds of workers are women, while in the highest paidten occupations close to two-thirds of workers are men. Women'smedian earnings are lower than men in the ten most commonoccupations, in the ten highest paid occupations, and in the tenlowest paid occupations.

Professional financial advisors have the dubious distinction ofhaving the highest gender wage gap for a week of full-time work. Inthis occupation, the female-to-male earnings ratio is 58.4 percent,equal to a weekly gender wage gap of 41.6 percent (based on medianearnings for full-time workers). The national weekly genderearnings gap for full-time work is 18.8 percent.

A new IWPR report, Ending Sex and Race Discriminationin the Workplace: Legal Interventions That Push the Envelope,sheds light on factors contributing to the gender wage gap andsteps that employers can take to eliminate unequal pay.

The report is based on the analysis of 502 sex and/or raceemployment discrimination settlements that became effective between2000 and 2008 and includes case studies in four industries:uniformed services (including police and fire departments),agribusiness and food processing (including migrant or undocumentedworkers), aerospace manufacturing, and financial services.

"Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 holds the promise ofequality for women and minorities," said Dr. Heidi Hartmann,President of IWPR. "Even though we are still far from equality,Title VII litigation has fueled progress for women in the workplaceand class action has been the key to bringing about greaterfairness at work, improving workplaces for all workers—not only forthose who brought the suit.

The report points to policies and practices employers shouldadopt to prevent wage discrimination, such as the public posting ofjob and promotion opportunities; transparency in the criteria forpay and promotion decisions; accountability of supervisors; and,the analysis of pay and promotion decisions to make sure thatdecisions are not biased.

According to the report, certified class action settlements aremore likely to include ways to hold supervisors accountable forpreventing discrimination and to introduce quantitative measures tomonitor progress in achieving equal opportunity in workplace.

"For over 15 years, financial service companies have been suedagain and again because of the systematic sex discrimination inpay, allocation of business leads, and promotions," said Dr. EvelynMurphy, Director of the Wage Project and co-author of report. "Eachclass action lawsuit provides fresh examples of discriminatorypractices and makes a contribution towards tackling them. Classaction lawsuits are not a magic wand for eradicatingdiscrimination, but they can help hold companies accountable forillegal practices."

The report describes instances of both subtle and outrightdiscrimination, including: the denial of higher pay to womenbecause they are married, the denial of promotions despite higherqualifications than their male counterparts, and unequal access toovertime and weekend earnings on the assumption that women wouldnot want those opportunities due to family obligations. Mostdistressingly, some of the cases involved instances of sexualviolence, including assault.

"Anyone who ever thought that 'choice' is the primary reasonbehind the gender wage gap should have a look at these litigationcase studies," said Ariane Hegewisch, Study Director at IWPR andlead author of the report. "They show the myriad of factors whichcontribute to keeping women's earnings lower within jobs, and tokeeping them out of the better paid jobs."