An Obama administration initiative on differences in pay by gender likely will have little impact on federal agencies since they already report the kind of data that proposed rules from the EEOC would require from private sector companies with more than 100 employees.
Further, several studies have found that because of the way the government classifies jobs, there is less difference in pay by gender among federal employees than in the general workforce.
For example, a 2014 report from OPM found that women working for the federal government on average earn about 13 percent less than men on average but that is largely due to women on average being concentrated in lower-paying occupations. At managerial and senior executive levels, there was virtually no difference—although the report noted that women hold only about a third of those positions.
Women also are under-represented in the so-called STEM—scientific, technical, engineering and math—occupations that also pay well, it said.
After controlling for occupation and certain other factors including educational level, the difference was 3.8 percent on average. Similarly, a 2009 GAO report found a 7 percent pay gap in similar positions that could not be accounted for by factors such as experience and educational levels.
Both reports said they could not confirm pay discrimination but neither did it rule it out. In light of the 2014 report, OPM told agencies to examine their use of pay authorities that allow for higher starting salaries on grounds of superior qualifications of the candidate. Last year a follow-up directive told agencies to avoid putting excessive emphasis on past salaries—which could have been artificially low due to gender discrimination by those employers—when setting starting salaries.
