The U.S. Labor Market Is Still A Man's World

Even though progress has been made in closing the gender pay gap in recent years, the U.S. still has a massive disparity in earnings between men and women. The Washington-based Institute for Women's Policy Research examined the problem and found that the pay gap is far greater than normally assumed with women's income 51 percent less than mens in the period from 2001 to 2015.

Their research found that today women earn just 48 cents to the typical men's dollar, far less than the 80 cents usually reported. Between 1968 and 1982, men took home $51,575 on average while women earned a mere $14,379. From 2001 to 2015, men still made over $50,000 on average while women saw their average paypacket go up to just under $30,000. For women, that figure includes time off for family and child care.

The report found that women are more likely to take time off work than men but those that do have to pay a high price. Women who took one year off work had earnings 39 percent lower than those who worked all 15 years between 2001 and 2015.

The U.S. remains the only country, along with Papua New Guinea, that does not guarantee women paid maternity leave. The research calls for an improvement in affordable child care and access to paid leave for women in the U.S. to strengthen their participation in the labor force and close the wage gap.