Gender Wage Gap Narrows Amid Affordability Crisis, but Black and Latina Women Still Left Behind

The surprising improvement in the wage gap for full-time year-round workers reflects today's high-cost economy, with Black and Latina women workers seeing their wage gaps widen.

WASHINGTON, Sept. 16, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- The Institute for Women's Policy Research (IWPR) has published its analysis of the Census Bureau's annual income data, finding that the gender wage gap for full-time year-round workers narrowed in 2025, reversing the two-year decline in women's relative earnings and returning them to the level of the immediate post-pandemic economic recovery.

At the same time, the wage gaps for Black women working full-time and all Latina workers (including part-time) widened due to unprecedented job losses. During the first year of the second Trump administration, Black women earned just 63.8 cents for every dollar earned by a White man.

IWPR analysis reveals that at the current rate, it will take until 2230 for Black women to reach pay equity, and until 2156 for Latina women.

"Black and Latina women—and our entire economy—cannot afford to wait more than a century for them to be paid the value they contribute to our economy," said IWPR President and CEO Dr. Jamila K. Taylor. "From the more than 250,000 Black women who lost jobs in 2025 amid the administration's attacks on federal employees, to the Latina women facing fear and uncertainty thanks to immigration enforcement that targets their communities, women of color are bearing the brunt of our sluggish economy—and the need for real policy change is more urgent than ever."

In 2025, real (inflation-adjusted) earnings increased for women working full-time year-round by 3.2%, while men working full-time year-round saw their earnings plateau. In addition, women-dominated sectors like educational services and health care were the primary sources of job growth last year but remain undervalued, with consistently lower wages compared with other sectors.

"While today's findings were surprising given that the wage gap for weekly earnings widened for an unprecedented third year in a row, they reflect an economy in which costs continue to go up, wage growth is not happening fast enough, and every household member must work as much as possible," said Dr. Kate Bahn, IWPR's chief economist and senior vice president of research. "Rather than signifying a real improvement in women's labor market outcomes, this narrowing is merely a return to prior trends, and Black and Latina women are still being left behind."

Read the full economic analysis here, and hear IWPR's Bahn discussion of what the data tells us—and what it doesn't—here.

SOURCE Institute For Women's Policy Research