Dive Brief:

• Women who attempt to negotiate higher pay with prospective employers are more likely to be rejected than men who take the same approach, according to the results of a Pew Research Center survey published Wednesday. 
• The February survey of U.S. workers asked respondents to state whether they asked for higher pay than offered when they were last hired. Men were more likely than women to say that they had done so, Pew said. Yet 38% of women said that, after asking for higher pay, they received only the employer’s initial offer, compared to 31% of men who asked for higher pay.
• Asked why they decided not to negotiate higher pay, 42% of women said they did not feel comfortable asking for higher pay, compared to 33% of men. Men in the survey were more likely than women to say that they were satisfied with the pay levels employers offered, Pew found.

Dive Insight:

The past year has seen increased pressure on employers to institute pay equity from regulators, workers and advocacy groups as well as organizational leaders. But past research has shown that the U.S. gender pay gap is nothing if not persistent.

A March data analysis by Pew found that women in the country earned an average of 82% of what men earned in 2022, up from 80% in 2002. Pew said the gap is smaller for workers between the ages 25 to 34 compared to the overall population, with women in this cohort earning an average of 92 cents for every dollar earned by a man in the same group.

“Even though women have increased their presence in higher-paying jobs traditionally dominated by men, such as professional and managerial positions, women as a whole continue to be overrepresented in lower-paying occupations relative to their share of the workforce,” Carolina Aragão, research associate at Pew, wrote in the analysis. “This may contribute to gender differences in pay. Other factors that are difficult to measure, including gender discrimination, may also contribute to the ongoing wage discrepancy.”

By some accounts, gender-based disparities have improved in select industries. For example, a recent Aquent report found that the gap between men and women in marketing, creative and design roles was 2.7% in 2022, compared to 16% in 2021.

A wave of state and local governments have taken aim at pay inquiries by passing pay transparency laws. California, Colorado, Nevada, New York and other jurisdictions adopted laws within the past two years requiring employers to disclose pay ranges in job applications, while others require employers to provide those ranges upon request. Employers tested the limits of these laws, however; some initially offered pay ranges spanning hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Public accountability is one way to hold employers’ feet to the fire on pay equity commitments, but it is not the only way. Pew noted in its March research that organizations also may need to address societal and cultural norms — including those that concern flexibility and work-life balance — to further narrow the gender pay gap.