The gender wage gap is now the smallest it’s been since it started being tracked in 1979

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The gender wage gap is now the smallest it’s been since it started being tracked in 1979

The future seemed bleak for working women after two decades of little progress in closing the pay gap and a pandemic-induced recession.

But the U.S. might be a small step closer to achieving equality for women in the workplace — or at least in their paychecks.

The difference in earnings between full-time working women and men is now the narrowest on record, according to an Axios analysis of data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which was published earlier this week.

Full-time working women had median weekly earnings of $1,001 last quarter, about 84% of the $1,181 median for men. It’s the smallest the gap has been since 1979, the first year for which earnings data is available. That year, women’s median earnings were 62% of men’s.