Women in the labor force: a databook

Errors were found in tables 23, 24, and 32 of this report. The tables were reissued on December 9, 2016, to correct the data.

U.S. BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS

DECEMBER 2015

REPORT 1059

Women in the labor force: a databook

large share of women work full time and year-round. Over time, women have increasingly attained higher levels of education: among women ages 25 to 64 who are in the labor force, the proportion with a college degree more than tripled from 1970 to 2014, increasing from 11.2 percent to 40.0 percent. Women's earnings as a proportion of men's earnings also have grown over time. In 1979, women working full time earned 62 percent of what men earned; in 2014, women's earnings were 83 percent of men's.

This report presents historical and recent labor force and earnings data for women and men from the Current Population Survey (CPS), a national monthly survey of approximately 60,000 households conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau for the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Unless otherwise noted, data are annual averages from the CPS. (For a detailed description of the source of the data and an explanation of concepts and definitions used, see the Technical Notes at the end of this report.)

Highlights

Over the past 70 years, women's participation in labor force activities has greatly expanded. Immediately following World War II, less than one-third of women were in the labor force. However, women soon began to participate in greater numbers, and their labor force participation rose rapidly from the 1960s through the 1980s before slowing in the 1990s. Women reached the peak of their labor force participation in 1999, with a rate of 60.0 percent. Since then, labor force participation among women has declined, to 57.0 percent in 2014, which is still relatively high by historical standards. In addition, a

Selected demographic characteristics

In 2014, 57.0 percent of women were in the labor force, edging down 0.2 percentage point from 2013. Men's labor force participation, which always has been much higher than that for women, declined by 0.5 percentage point to 69.2 percent in 2014. (See table 2.)

CONTENTS

Highlights.........................................................................1-4 Statistical Tables.........................................................5?101 Technical Notes........................................................ 102-105

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The overall unemployment rate for women in 2014 was 6.1 percent, a decline of 1.0 percentage point from 2013. The rate for men was 6.3 percent, down 1.3 percentage points from 2013. Women's jobless rates varied by race and ethnicity. Asian women had the lowest rate (4.6 percent), followed by White (5.2 percent), Hispanic (8.2 percent), and Black (10.5 percent) women. (See tables 2 and 3.)

Labor force participation varies by marital status and differs between women and men. Divorced women had a higher labor force participation rate than married women, 64.2 percent compared with 58.4 percent. By contrast, married men were more likely to participate in the labor force (73.5 percent) than divorced men (66.1 percent). (See table 4.)

Among mothers, the labor force participation rate was higher for those with children 6 to 17 years old than for those with younger children. In March 2014, the rate for women with children 6 to 17 years old was 75.8 percent. The rate for those with children under 6 years old was 64.3 percent, and the rate for women with children under 3 years old was lower, at 61.8 percent. (See table 5; data were collected in the 2014 Annual Social and Economic Supplement to the CPS.)

Unmarried mothers have higher labor force participation rates than married mothers. In March 2014, 76.2 percent of unmarried mothers with children under 18 years old were in the labor force, compared with 68.4 percent of married mothers with children in the same age range. (See table 6; data were collected in the 2014 Annual Social and Economic Supplement to the CPS.)

The labor force participation rate of all women with children under 18 years of age was 70.8 percent in March 2014, up slightly from 70.3 percent in 2013. (See tables 6 and 7; data were collected in the Annual Social and Economic Supplement to the CPS.)

Educational attainment

The educational attainment of women ages 25 to 64 in the labor force has risen substantially over the past 44 years. In 2014, 40 percent of this group held college degrees,

compared with 11 percent in 1970. About 6 percent of women had less than a high school diploma (that is, did not graduate from high school) in 2014, down from 34 percent in 1970. (See table 9.)

Occupation and industry

In 2014, women accounted for 52 percent of all workers employed in management, professional, and related occupations, somewhat more than their share of total employment (47 percent). The share of women in specific occupations within this large category varied. For example, 20 percent of software developers, 26 percent of chief executives, and 33 percent of lawyers were women, whereas 90 percent of registered nurses, 81 percent of elementary and middle school teachers, and 63 percent of accountants and auditors were women. (See table 11.)

Employed Asian and White women were more likely to work in high-paying management, professional, and related occupations (49 percent and 43 percent, respectively) in 2014 than were employed Black (35 percent) and Hispanic (26 percent) women. Meanwhile, Hispanic (32 percent) and Black (28 percent) women were more likely than Asian (21 percent) and White (20 percent) women to work in service occupations, which generally pay lower wages. (See table 12.)

In 2014, women accounted for more than half of all workers within several industry sectors: financial activities (53 percent), education and health services (75 percent), leisure and hospitality (51 percent), and other services (53 percent). However, women were substantially underrepresented (relative to their share of total employment) in agriculture (25 percent), mining (13 percent), construction (9 percent), manufacturing (29 percent), and transportation and utilities (23 percent). (See table 14.)

Earnings

In 2014, women who worked full time in wage and salary jobs had median usual weekly earnings of $719, which represented 83 percent of men's median weekly earnings ($871). Among women, earnings were higher for Asians ($841) and Whites ($734) than for Blacks ($611) and

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Hispanics ($548). Women's-to-men's earnings ratios were higher for Blacks (90 percent) and Hispanics (89 percent) than for Whites (82 percent) and Asians (78 percent). (See table 16; note that the comparisons of earnings in this report are on a broad level and do not control for many factors that may be important in explaining earnings differences.)

In 2014, female full-time wage and salary workers ages 25 and older with only a high school diploma had median usual weekly earnings of $578, which represented 82 percent of the earnings of women with an associate's degree ($701) and 55 percent of the earnings of women with a bachelor's degree or higher ($1,049). (See table 17.)

Median usual weekly earnings of full-time wage and salary workers were the highest in 2014 for female pharmacists ($1,902), nurse practitioners ($1,682), and lawyers ($1,590). (See table 18.)

In 2014, 4.8 percent of all women (approximately 1.9 million women) paid at an hourly rate had earnings at or below the prevailing federal minimum wage ($7.25 per hour). Among women 25 years and older who were paid at an hourly rate, 3.2 percent had earnings at or below the minimum wage, compared with 11.4 percent of women ages 16 to 24. (See table 20.)

Hours of work

In 2014, 26 percent of employed women usually worked part time--that is, less than 35 hours per week. The percentage of women working part time has not changed much over the past five decades. In comparison, 13 percent of employed men usually worked part time in 2014. This rate has gradually trended up over time. (See table 21.)

In general, employed women work fewer hours per week than men. On average, women worked 35.9 hours per week in 2014, compared with 41.0 hours for men. (See table 22.)

Of all women who worked at some point during calendar year 2013, 61 percent worked full time and year round, compared with 41 percent in 1970. The proportion of men who worked full time and year-round rose slightly, from 66 percent in 1970 to 73 percent in 2013. (See table 23; data

were collected in the 1971 and 2014 Annual Social and Economic Supplements to the CPS and reflect earnings and work experience in the previous calendar year.)

Married-couple families

Among married-couple families, 53 percent had earnings from both the wife and the husband in 2013, compared with 44 percent in 1967. Couples in which only the husband worked represented 19 percent of married-couple families in 2013, versus 36 percent in 1967. (See table 24; data were collected in the 1968 and 2014 Annual Social and Economic Supplements to the CPS and reflect earnings and work experience in the previous calendar year.)

In 2013, working wives contributed 37 percent of their families' incomes, up by 10 percentage points from 1970, when wives' earnings accounted for 27 percent of their families' total income. The proportion of wives earning more than their husbands also has grown: in 1987, 18 percent of working wives earned more than their working spouses; in 2013, the proportion was 29 percent. (See tables 25 and 26; data were collected in the 1971, 1988, and 2014 Annual Social and Economic Supplements to the CPS and reflect earnings and work experience in the previous calendar year.)

Other characteristics

Among 2014 high school graduates, young women (73 percent) were more likely than young men (64 percent) to be enrolled in college in October 2014. (See table 29; data are from the October 2014 School Enrollment Supplement to the CPS.)

Young women 16 to 24 years old who were high school dropouts between October 2013 and 2014 had a labor force participation rate of 41.9 percent, while those who had graduated from high school between January and October 2014 but were not enrolled in college had a rate of 68.0 percent. (See table 29; data are from the October 2014 School Enrollment Supplement to the CPS.)

In October 2014, 41.3 percent of women ages 16 to 24 who were enrolled in either high school or college were in the labor force. Young men in the same age group who were

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enrolled in school had a lower labor force participation rate (34.6 percent). Among those not enrolled in school, women were less likely to be in the labor force than men (74.4 percent compared with 83.1 percent). (See table 30; data are from the October 2014 School Enrollment Supplement to the CPS.)

Multiple jobholders and the selfemployed

In 2014, 5.3 percent of employed women held more than one job. The rate for men was lower, at 4.5 percent. (See table 31.) In 2014, 5.3 percent of working women in nonagricultural industries were self-employed, compared with 7.4 percent for their male counterparts. In 2014, 40 percent of self-employed workers were women, compared with 27 percent in 1976. (See table 32.)

Foreign born

Foreign-born women were somewhat less likely than native-born women to be in the labor force in 2014 (53.9 percent compared with 57.5 percent). Of those in the labor force, foreign-born women were slightly more likely to be unemployed than were native-born women (6.5 percent as opposed to 6.0 percent). By contrast, foreign-born men were more likely to be in the labor force (78.7 percent) than native-born men (67.4 percent) and were less likely to be unemployed (5.0 percent compared with 6.5 percent). (See table 33.)

Union membership

In 2014, 10.5 percent of female wage and salary workers were members of unions, compared with 11.7 percent of their male counterparts. For both men and women, the union membership rate in 2014 was lower than in 1983, but the rate has fallen much more for men over the 1983?2014 period. In 1983, union membership rates were 24.7 percent for men and 14.6 percent for women. (See table 34.)

Veterans

There were 10.7 million veterans of the U.S. Armed Forces in the labor force in 2014. About 1.4 million of them, or 13 percent, were women. The unemployment rate for female veterans was 6.0 percent in 2014. (See table 35.)

Women with disabilities

Of the 15.6 million women with disabilities in 2014, 2.6 million, or 16.6 percent, were in the labor force. Nearly half of women with disabilities were age 65 and older; labor force participation among this age group was 5.2 percent. The labor force participation rate was 27.8 percent for those ages 16 to 64. For women with a disability who were age 16 and older, the unemployment rate was 12.5 percent, more than twice that for women without a disability (5.8 percent). (See table 36.)

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Statistical Tables

Selected demographic characteristics

Table 1. Employment status of the civilian noninstitutional population, by age and gender, 2014 annual averages............. 8 Table 2. Employment status of the civilian noninstitutional population, 16 years and older, by gender, 1948?2014 annual averages. .................................................................................................................................................................... 11 Table 3. Employment status, by race, age, gender, and Hispanic or Latino ethnicity, 2014 annual averages ..................... 17 Table 4. Employment status, by marital status and gender, 2014 annual averages.............................................................. 19 Table 5. Employment status, by gender, presence and age of children, race, and Hispanic or Latino ethnicity, March 2014 ........................................................................................................................................................................... 20 Table 6. Employment status of women, by presence and age of youngest child, marital status, race, and Hispanic or Latino ethnicity, March 2014............................................................................................................................................. 22 Table 7. Employment status of women, by presence and age of youngest child, March 1975?March 2014....................... 25

Educational attainment

Table 8. Employment status of the civilian noninstitutional population, 25 to 64 years of age, by educational attainment and gender, 2014 annual averages...................................................................................................................... 28 Table 9. Percent distribution of the civilian labor force, 25 to 64 years of age, by educational attainment and gender, 1970?2014......................................................................................................................................................... 29

Occupation and industry

Table 10. Employed people, by occupation and gender, 2013 and 2014 annual averages.................................................. 33 Table 11. Employed people, by detailed occupation and gender, 2014 annual averages.................................................... 35 Table 12. Employed women, by occupation, race, and Hispanic or Latino ethnicity, 2014 annual averages..................... 47 Table 13. Employed people, by industry and gender, 2013 and 2014 annual averages....................................................... 48 Table 14. Employed people, by detailed industry and gender, 2014 annual averages......................................................... 51 Table 15. Employed women, by industry, race, and Hispanic or Latino ethnicity, 2014 annual averages.......................... 59

Earnings

Table 16. Median usual weekly earnings of full-time wage and salary workers, in current dollars, by race, Hispanic or Latino ethnicity, and gender, 1979?2014 annual averages ................................................................................ 60 Table 17. Median usual weekly earnings of full-time wage and salary workers, 25 years and older, by educational attainment and gender, 2014 annual averages.................................................................................................... 62 Table 18. Median usual weekly earnings of full-time wage and salary workers, by detailed occupation and gender, 2014 annual averages......................................................................................................................................... 64 Table 19. Median usual weekly earnings of full-time wage and salary workers, by industry and gender, 2014 annual averages ..................................................................................................................................................................... 77

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