ECONOMIC SILUET: More women are out-earning their husbands in the U.S.

Kamis, 20 April 2023

More women are out-earning their husbands in the U.S.

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CLOSING THE GAP

Thursday, April 20, 2023

Morgan Smith is a Work reporter at CNBC Make It. You can follow her on Twitter @thewordsmithm.

In almost half of opposite-sex marriages in the U.S., women are now earning the same as their husbands — or out-earning them by an average of $53,000.

Although men are still the breadwinners in most households, the share of women making just as much or more than their husbands has nearly tripled in the last 50 years, a new Pew Research Center survey has found.

Spouses are earning the same income in nearly one-third, or 29%, of opposite-sex marriages, a significant jump from just 11% in 1972. In egalitarian marriages, men and women's earnings are almost identical: In 2022, the median earnings for wives in such marriages was $60,000, while husbands earned $62,000.

About 16% of opposite-sex marriages in the U.S. have a breadwinner wife, up from 5% five decades earlier, Pew reports. When the wife is the breadwinner, however, her median earnings are about $88,000 per year, while her husband's are roughly $35,000, less than 40% of her income.

Education and motherhood have a strong influence on married women's earnings, according to Richard Fry, a senior researcher at Pew.

Women increasingly outpace men in college enrollment and graduation rates: Among those ages 25 and older, women are more likely than men to have a four-year college degree, Pew reports.

"When wives are better educated than their husbands, they're more likely to out-earn them," says Fry.

American women are also having fewer children and having them later in life, another trend that likely helped boost women's earnings, says Ruth Thomas, a pay equity strategist at Payscale.

Past research has shown that the pay gap gets worse around the same time women are more likely to become parents and have young children at home.

If women are choosing to have children later in their careers, when they are earning more, or having fewer children, their earnings are better insulated from the "motherhood penalty."

Natasha Bowman, 44, became the sole breadwinner for her household 12 years ago when she and her husband, Kent, moved from Arkansas to New York with their two young children.

At the time, her daughter Shannon was 3 and her son Campbell was 11. Bowman, a lawyer, earned significantly more than her husband, who was a high school history teacher.

Her six-figure salary alone was enough to support the family of four, so she and Kent decided it would be more cost-effective for him to stay at home with Shannon instead of paying for day care.

She's still the sole breadwinner in her household, an arrangement Bowman says has worked "incredibly well" for her marriage despite the backlash she and Kent have received from relatives and friends over the years.

"We've both found purpose and fulfillment focusing on the things we're good at, whether it's our jobs or caring for our family," says Bowman. "It's just cut out a lot of the stress that comes with trying to juggle it all."

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