Dive Brief:

• Despite all the media hype on how US employers are trying hard to help women succeed after having a baby, it's that group which continues to pay the price in career advancement and wages for starting a family, according to a new study.
• The Visier Insights Gender Equity report, which offers workforce intelligence to employers, uncovers a direct correlation between the "manager divide," a growing underrepresentation of women compared to men in manager positions from age 32 onwards, and a widening of the gender wage gap for large US employers.
• The report also found that eliminating the manager divide, which coincides with the years in which women typically have children, would cut the gender wage gap by nearly one third.

Dive Insight:

John Schwarz, Founder and CEO, Visier, says every CEO should be looking at gender equity, because studies have shown the equal economic contribution women make in the workforce. Yet, he adds, employers have struggled to achieve the goal of equity in compensation.

He says the report — made possible by the contribution of our customers to our unique workforce database — gives HR leaders the factual basis on which to implement programs that can accelerate gender equity.

"It turns out that the gender inequity is not just a compensation issue, it is a problem of unequal participation of women in the higher paying managerial jobs" Schwarz says. The gender wage gap is driven by the Manager Divide: gender inequity in manager positions that is closely tied to the childcare years, when women experience increased demands from their home life.

It appears that potential remains negatively affected by taking time off to have a baby. To Schwarz, employers have good intentions to achieve gender equity, but have been lost in chaotic and conflicting data sources.

"Business leaders need to be  making decisions based on confident knowledge, not on guesswork," he says.