Black Women Work More, Earn LESS than White Women, Data Show

Despite recent news stories implying the contrary, on most measures of economic status, U.S. Census Bureau data show that African American women are worse off than white women. This holds true when comparing the median earnings of white and African American full-time, full-year workers at every education level, and when comparing poverty rates and unemployment rates for the two groups. Both white and African American women earn less than comparable men. According to recently released 2004 data from the U.S. Census Bureau, African American women working full-time, full-year earn $26,992 in median annual earnings, compared with $32,036 earned by comparable white women workers. When comparing the median earnings of all workers (regardless of work schedule or amount of time worked), college-educated African American women do earn slightly more than white women. This is likely due to the greater work effort shown by African American women who tend to work more than other women with the same educational background. Recent analysis conducted by the Economic Policy Institute shows that college-educated African American women work, on average, 1,923 hours per year, compared to the 1,734 hours per year worked by college-educated white women. [more] and [more]