For Immediate Release
Sep 9, 2025
Media Contact
Nazirah Ahmad
era@emccommunications.com
The new income data shows persistent pay disparities based on race and gender amid recent systemic attacks on working women
Sept. 9, 2025—Today, the U.S Census Bureau released new wage data from 2024, which shows a persistent wage gap for women. According to the new data, the average woman working full-time, year-round typically is paid just 81 cents per $1.00 paid to the average man, a gap that has grown wider since 2023. When looking at all workers, including those working one or more part-time, seasonal, part-year, and full-time job, women, on average, only make 76 cents compared to men. The pay disparities are even more severe for most women of color.
According to the Census Bureau, the median earnings of men who worked full-time, year-round ($71,090) increased by 3.7% in 2024 compared to 2023, while median earnings of women who worked full-time, year-round ($57,520) did not change significantly.
Here is the new breakdown on the pay gaps by race and gender:
All women compared to all men:
- Full-time: 81 cents
- All workers: 76 cents
Black women compared to white, non-Hispanic men:
- Full time: 65 cents
- All workers: 63 cents
Latina women compared to white, non-Hispanic men:
- Full time: 58 cents
- All workers: 54 cents
Asian American women compared to white, non-Hispanic men:
- Full time: 96 cents
- All workers: 85 cents
Note: Data used to calculate the pay gaps experienced by Native American women, Native Hawaiian Pacific Islander (NHPI) women, mothers, and women with disabilities are expected to be released in subsequent data sets this week and some later this year.
This data release comes just weeks after President Trump fired the Bureau of Labor Statistics commissioner amid his broader attack on the federal agencies and data collection systems designed to protect working women.
“This is the time to move progress on women’s wages, not rollbacks,” said Noreen Farrell, Executive Director of Equal Rights Advocates and Chair of Equal Pay Today, a collaborative campaign housed at Equal Rights Advocates. “What we see today is a direct reflection of how slowly the nation moves to correct longstanding gender and racial inequities, stereotyping, and gaps in public policy that have easy fixes, like the Paycheck Fairness Act, One Fair Wage legislation, and Paid Family Leave for all. This is the unfinished business of our movement. Now is the time for employers, legislators, and advocates to come together to prioritize the economic health of American families. As workers, voters, consumers, business owners and investors, we must yield our power to close this gap once and for all.”
“Each year, these numbers show us the persistence of the devastating gender and racial wage gaps that women continue to face, made even more alarming by the 212,000 women who have left the workforce since January alone,” said Deborah J. Vagins, director of Equal Pay Today campaign, a project at Equal Rights Advocates. “The Trump Administration’s assault on workplace protections, dismantling DEI programs, and gutting civil rights enforcement, represents a coordinated effort to roll back decades of hard-won progress for workers. Wage justice means that families must be able to bring home everything they have rightfully earned, and they need robust federal protections and new policy tools to do so. Our policymakers have the power to ensure equity for all workers, to combat pay discrimination, to provide needed oversight of this Administration’s dismantling of civil rights agencies, and to lift countless families out of poverty by adopting policy solutions that address the key drivers of the wage gaps. We demand no less.”
Founded in 2013, the Equal Pay Today campaign is a national coalition of more than 50 nonprofit and advocacy organizations that advocate for pay equity for women and LGBTQIA+ people, especially women of color. Equal Pay Today is a project led by Equal Rights Advocates.
The current Equal Pay Today policy agenda offers solutions to address the many drivers of these egregious pay gaps and promote wage justice. Some recommendations include:
- implementing transparent pay practices and accountability mechanisms;
- strengthening current equal pay laws, passing new legislation to increase equity, ban workplace harassment, eliminate the subminimum and tipped wages for vulnerable workers; and
- support paid family leave, paid sick and safe leave, and other workplace protections.
To speak with equal pay experts from Equal Rights Advocates, contact Nazirah Ahmad at (704) 290-6869 or nazirah@emccommunications.com.
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