Worcester Business Journal Special Editions

36 Worcester Business Journal Mass. organizations push for more salary trans- parency to help reduce gender, racial pay gaps Sharing paychecks F or every $1 a man earns in Massachusetts, women earn 83 cents, according to data from the National Women's Law Center. at disparity is even greater for women of color, with Black women in Massachusetts earning 57.7 cents compared to white men, and Latina women earning 50 cents. ese figures aren't new, although they remain a jarring indicator of significant inequality in the workplace, as well as a gap that has proven difficult to close in a societal culture where discussing earnings in public or among peers remains largely taboo. But the persistent wage gap has certain organizations promoting a still radical notion flying in the face of that norm: salary transparency. "Salary is something that as a society, we have been told, 'Don't talk about this. Keep it to yourself,'" said public and political strategist Megan Costello, who has partnered with the Massachusetts Women's Forum on a project called Wage Equity Now, BY MONICA BUSCH Worcester Business Journal Staff Writer which is collecting and plans to publish raw pay gap data from Massachusetts companies. Raw wage gaps are the percent difference between the average salaries of various worker groups, like men and women. e norms around keeping salaries private, Costello said, have created a culture which holds women back, broadly, but specifically women of color, as well as Black men. "When we talk about structural racism and all of these things, that's really been the institution that has created this climate of pay secrecy, which has allowed for these inequities to persist," Costello said. Both employers and employees alike might balk at the idea of publishing pay gaps or sharing salary information, but the practice is not without precedent. Costello points to the United Kingdom, where the government publishes pay gap data for companies with 250 or more employees. at information is available in an easily searchable online database. Reporting Massachusetts salaries Similar to the UK database, the Wage Equity Now project, which Costello Megan Costello, strategist for Wage Equity Now hopes to see established as its own nonprofit in the future, is collecting data from participating companies of any size. Although asking employers to come forward with what might be less than flattering data may seem like an uphill battle, organizations like the YWCA, e Commonwealth Institute, and the Boston Women's Workforce Council have laid foundational work for a larger-scale transparency initiative, Costello said. "What I'm saying to [employers] is, 'is is a time where leadership is really needed,'" Costello said. "And one way you can show that you, as an employer, are deeply committed to solving the inequities that exist between men and women, that exists between people of color – specifically black and Latinx and white people – is you can be bold, and report this data." Public reporting does carry a public relations risk, which Costello acknowl- edged. Companies are making them- selves vulnerable when they share their own shortcomings, opening themselves up to criticism. But, Costello said, the other side to that proverbial coin is the option to course-correct in public view. Companies who participate in Wage Equity Now's mission give themselves the chance to show they are actively working to repair inequities in their workplace. "People appreciate honesty," Costello said. "ey appreciate transparency." To an extent, wage gaps and salaries by industry are already available. Public companies are required by the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission to disclose the earnings of their top executives, as well as give the median wage of all their employees and what the CEO-to-median-worker wage ratio is. e 2020 Worcester Almanac, released in early September by the Worcester Regional Research Bureau, showed in the city of Worcester in 2018, men out-earned women in every field reported on, with the greatest gap found in the transportation, warehousing and utilities category, where a woman's median salary is 46% of men in the same field. Women make up 21% of that workforce sector in Worcester. In fields with roughly an equal mix of genders, men consistently outearned their female coworkers. In the arts, entertain- ment, recreation, accommodation and food services sector, which is 47% men and 53% women, women earn 70% of what their male coworkers bring home. e smallest gap reported in the WRRB's almanac is in the finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing portion of the Worcester economy – another sector split relatively equally between male and female workers. In that sector, women earned 92% of what their male colleagues bring home. "ere's some volatility because it includes both full-time and part-time workers, and some of the industry cate- gories are pretty volatile with part-time," said Paul Matthews, executive director and CEO of WRRB. Increased legal protections Interest in salary transparency exceeds experimental research and beta pro- grams, at least in Massachusetts. On July 1, 2018, the Massachusetts Equal Pay Law went into effect, providing, among other things, protections for employees to share their pay with each other. UMass Memorial Health Care is among the 10 largest employers in Central Massachusetts, all of which do not disclose salary ranges on job postings. PHOTO | EDD COTE

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