The gender pay gap has been shrinking, according to the Census Bureau, but part of the reason for that is that men are making less money.
Men still make about $10,000 more per year on average than women, reports The Washington Post, but still,their earnings have fallen over the past 10 years since the recession.
This has put men's earnings below the levels in the 1970s and 1980s, meaning men are earning less money than their fathers and grandfathers did, said Mark Rank, an inequality expert at Washington University in St. Louis.
According to numbers adjusted for inflation, men's earnings dropped about 5 percent from 1973 to 2017, and earnings for African-American men fell more than for white men.
The data showed that men's average earnings dropped again in 2017, during the first year of President Donald Trump's administration, as well as for four years of President Barack Obama's eight years in office.
Women's average earnings, however, have climbed slightly. For example, since 2010, average earnings dropped by $2,000 for men, but rose by about $500 for women during the same period.
Median household income, however, is at an all-time high of $61,372, according to the Census report, but that's because more people are in the workforce, not because their wages are up.
The decline in men's earnings may be because of the drop of manufacturing jobs, or because of the decline in people who belong to labor unions, some experts believe.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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