Learn How To Research Your Wage Gap

Measure Your Wage Gap

In order to make the case for how much your salary should be increased, you need to know how much the wage gap is costing you.

Use the Getting Even Calculator to determine what your salary would be if you were a man, your wage gap, and how much the wage gap will cost you over time.

Document Your Personal Experiences of Sex Discrimination

Before you ask your employer to remedy the wage discrimination that you have experienced, you should put together an account of all the instances and types of discrimination that you have faced or continue to face.

1. Write down every time that you have felt that you were treated differently and unfairly because you are a woman.
2. Describe how your wages were less than men with whom you worked and less than men that were hired to do your job after you moved to another position.
3. Note the times you were overlooked for promotion or plum assignments that were instead given to male workers.
4. Record instances of sexual harassment – comments made by supervisors or co-workers, demeaning graffiti or posters in the office, and other things in your work environment that have made you feel uncomfortable as a woman.
5. If you feel that your marital status or motherhood have affected your assignments, wages, and promotions, put these experiences in words.
6. Describe whether your access to training programs, your ability to make overtime wages, your office space, and your benefits are less than male co-workers.
7. Gather any written evidence of these discriminatory acts.

 

 

Know Your Rights Under the Law

Sex discrimination in employment – in hiring, promotion, compensation, benefits, and other aspects of work – is against the law. Sex discrimination includes sexual harassment and pregnancy discrimination.

Read More in Isn’t Sex Discrimination Illegal?

Search the Sex Discrimination Case Database and Women’s Stories Database

In these databases you can find other cases like yours – women who hold similar jobs and experienced similar kinds of discrimination. Cases in the Sex Discrimination Database also may provide good examples of remedies for discriminatory practices in consent decrees and court rulings. These remedies suggest actions that your employer could take to improve women’s wages and working conditions before a lawsuit becomes necessary.