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HOW DOES EDUCATION AFFECT THE PAY GAP? As a rule, earnings increase as years of education increase for both men and women. Though more education is an effective tool for increasing earnings, women's median earnings are less than men's median earnings at every level of academic achievement (figure 7). In Graduating to a Pay Gap: The Earnings of Women and Men One Year after College Graduation, AAUW found that just one year after college graduation, women were paid 82 percent of what men were paid (AAUW, 2012). $2,000 $1,750 $1,500 $1,250 $1,000 $750 $500 $250 $0 FIGURE 7: Median Weekly Earnings, by Level of Education and Gender, 2017 • Women ■ Men XX% Women's earnings as a percentage of men's earnings $1,737 S1,378 S584 Less than a high school diploma High School graduate Some College or Associate degree Bachelor's degree Advanced degree Note: Based on median usual weekly earnings of full-time wage and salary workers, ages 25 and older, 2017 annual averages. Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (2018b) Across all racial and ethnic groups, American women now earn more college and postgraduate degrees than men (U.S. Department of Education, 2016b). Though education does not eliminate the gender pay gap, the success of women in postsecondary education is helping to narrow the overall gender pay gap. Without women's greater educational attainment, the current gender pay gap would be larger (Blau and Kahn, 2017). However, women with college degrees who work full time make, on average, 26 percent less than their male peers with college degrees (figure 7). It is important to note that this gap is larger than the gap for women overall; although women with degrees have higher earnings than women without degrees, men with degrees have even higher earnings. And even when ® THE SIMPLE TRUTH ABOUT THE GENDER PAY GAP I Fall 2018 Edition women gain degrees in more lucrative majors and pursue higher -paying occupations, women still tend to be concentrated in lower -paying subfields and are paid less across fields, even with advanced degrees (Carnevale, 2018). Furthermore, earnings at different education levels are affected by race and ethnicity, as well as gender. White women are paid more than black and Hispanic women at all education levels (figure 8). Research suggests that differences in education and other measurable factors explain part of the difference in earnings between racial and ethnic groups. However, as is the case with gender, part of the racial and ethnic pay gap cannot be explained by other factors known to affect earnings and is likely due to discrimination. AAUW • www.aauw.org