The gender pay gap — the gap between the median salaries of all working men and women in the U.S. — is often estimated at around 80 cents earned by women for every dollar earned by a man.
When controlled for factors such as race, the gap widens further. Black women earn 61 cents for every dollar earned by their white male counterparts. Native American women earn 58 cents to every dollar, and Latina women earn 53 cents.
Another variable that dramatically impacts how much men and women make is geography.
Job search site Zippia analyzed data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the American Community Survey and compared the median annual earnings of year-round, full-time workers (those who worked 35 or more hours per week for at least 50 weeks of the year) including wages, salaries and self-employment incomes of men and women in all 50 states and Washington, D.C.
What they found was that where you live significantly impacts how much you make — especially if you're a woman.
"We were surprised by two trends," Chris Kolmar, co-founder of Zippia, tells CNBC Make It. "One, how static the gender pay gap has been over the past 14-plus years, and two, that there is such extreme geographic disparities — the top quintile is some 15 percentage points better than the bottom quintile."
This map from Zippia illustrates the states with the largest and the smallest gender pay gaps:
Courtesy of Zippia
Here's how big the gender pay gap — as defined as women's earnings as a percentage of men's, based on the median annual earnings of year-round, full-time workers — is in each state:
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1. Louisiana
Pay gap: 31.1%
2. Utah
Pay gap: 29.8%
3. West Virginia
Pay gap: 29.1%
4. Wyoming
Pay gap: 29.0%
5. North Dakota
Pay gap: 26.9%
6. Indiana
Pay gap: 26.0%
7. Montana
Pay gap: 25.5%
8. Oklahoma
Pay gap: 25.5%
9. Idaho
Pay gap: 25.5%
10. Alabama
Pay gap: 25.4%
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11. South Dakota
Pay gap: 23.9%
12. Nebraska
Pay gap: 23.2%
13. Mississippi
Pay gap: 23.1%
14. Kansas
Pay gap: 23.0%
15. Washington
Pay gap: 23.0%
16. New Hampshire
Pay gap: 23.0%
17. Iowa
Pay gap: 22.8%
18. Missouri
Pay gap: 22.2%
19. Michigan
Pay gap: 22.2%
20. Virginia
Pay gap: 21.9%
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21. South Carolina
Pay gap: 21.8%
22. Ohio
Pay gap: 21.8%
23. Illinois
Pay gap: 21.7%
24. Pennsylvania
Pay gap: 21.3%
25. Kentucky
Pay gap: 21.3%
26. Wisconsin
Pay gap: 20.6%
27. Maine
Pay gap: 20.4%
28. Texas
Pay gap: 20.3%
29. New Jersey
Pay gap: 20.0%
30. Connecticut
Pay gap: 19.9%
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31. Alaska
Pay gap: 19.8%
32. Arkansas
Pay gap: 19.6%
33. New Mexico
Pay gap: 19.6%
34. Tennessee
Pay gap: 19.3%
35. Oregon
Pay gap: 19.1%
36. Massachusetts
Pay gap: 18.5%
37. Minnesota
Pay gap: 18.5%
38. Georgia
Pay gap: 18.4%
39. Nevada
Pay gap: 18.1%
40. Hawaii
Pay gap: 17.8%
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41. Colorado
Pay gap: 17.7%
42. North Carolina
Pay gap: 17.3%
43. Rhode Island
Pay gap: 16.7%
44. Vermont
Pay gap: 16.5%
45. Arizona
Pay gap: 15.9%
46. Maryland
Pay gap: 15.4%
47. Delaware
Pay gap: 14.9%
48. Florida
Pay gap: 14.6%
49. New York
Pay gap: 12.9%
50. District of Columbia
Pay gap: 12.3%
51. California
Pay gap: 12.2%
A woman and man work at their desks.
Twenty/20
Kolmar notes that many of the states with the smallest pay gaps have strong legislation that encourages and enforces equal pay. "We also noticed that there is a correlation between the number of laws in a state regarding equal pay and the gender pay gap — more laws correlates with a smaller gap," he says.
In 2005, New York had a pay gap of 20.5%. In 2019, that figure was closer to 12.9%. During that time, New York passed several pieces of legislation aimed at closing the gender pay gap, including The New York State Fair Pay Act.
The American Association of University Women (AAUW) reports that just two states, Alabama and Mississippi, have no legal equal pay protections. According to Zippia's research, these states have above-average pay gaps of 25.4% and 23.1%, respectively.
Of note, Zippia's analysis does not take part-time workers' earnings into consideration, or the earnings of undocumented workers. These figures would likely impact the results of the analysis.
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