In Part-Time Jobs, Women Outearn Men

The oft-lamented gender wage gap disappears and actually reverses when only part-time workers are considered, according to a new data release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics. Data refer to the sole or principal job of full-time and part-time workers.

Among workers who usually work part time (that is, under 35 hours), the median usual weekly earnings of women were 110 percent of that for men in 2012. For full-timers (35 hours and up), the median female worker made about 81 percent of what the median male worker made.

Oddly, for the part-timers who worked the fewest hours â€" that is one to four hours a week â€" the wage gap still went in men’s favor.

These numbers, of course, probably reflect which kinds of jobs correlate with certain numbers of hours per week. In other words, the kind of three-hour-per-week position that a woman is more likely to take may happen to be in a lower-paying occupation than the kind of three-hour-per-week position that a man is more likely to take.

Even within occupations, though, there are differences in pay. That same report also had an extensive table showing the median wage gap by occupation for all full-time workers (see Table 2). Note that these numbers are for median workers logging at least 35 hours in an occupation, and do not control for how many hours are worked beyond that 35-hour threshold. Here are some of the occupations that offer the greatest parity, and the least:

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics. Data are from 2012.

The report also reveals that the wage gap is narrower for younger workers, but that’s actually been true for a while.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Women in their teens have made around 90 percent of what their male counterparts earned since at least 1979, the earliest year of data listed, and the same is true for women in their early 20s since about 1987. Over time, women 25 to 34 have also sharply narrowed the wage gap, perhaps related to the fact that women have delayed childbearing. But once you hit that 35-to-44 age range, a penalty of around 22 to 25 cents on the dollar seems pretty persistent.