There’s no denying that tech has had a gender and racial issues for quite some time. Between a lack of representation and the persistent problem of pay, the industry — which prides itself on progressive support — has been far from stellar when it comes to diversity. Now, a clear-cut study shows that these companies are actually getting worse at promoting equal pay, which is not a trend you want to see coming out of tech. As the study points out, these low ratings are largely due to the industry’s unwillingness to provide unadjusted gender and racial pay gap information without a written mandate. And that is arguably the biggest part of the problem. While employees across the US have been convinced that discussing your salary is taboo, the reality is that being open and honest about how employees are compensated is one of the most effective ways of curbing wage gaps. After all, it would be quite difficult to justify the discrepancies between coworkers when it’s all out in the open. Some companies already make transparency a priority when it comes to their employees’ salaries. Buffer is arguably the best example, providing in-depth salary information on every single employee that works for the company in a public document. The company still experiences a slight wage gap, but thanks to the transparency, solving it is a constant discussion rather than something that gets brushed under the rug. As far as racial pay gaps are concerned, the average Black worker makes only 75 cents on the dollar, with Black men making 89 cents on the dollar. Hispanic men are arguably the closest, but still only make 91 cents on the dollar, a meaningful and problematic difference. The gender gap is also a notable problem, with women workers making only 82 cents on the dollar. When you consider women of color, black women make only 62 cents on the dollar, Native women making only 60 cents on the dollar, and Latina women making only 52 cents on the dollar. While solving this problem might seem like a Herculean undertaking, the reality is that righting these inequalities would have a positive impact on the economy. A PwC study found that closing the gender wage gap could boost the GDP by up to $2 trillion, which should be more than enough to convince even the staunch opponents of equal pay that it should be made a priority.
