As Obama Spotlights Gender Gap in Wages, His Own Payroll Draws Scrutiny
WASHINGTON — President Obama
on Tuesday will call attention to what he has said is an
“embarrassment” in America: the fact that women make, on average, only
77 cents for every dollar that a man earns.
But
critics of the administration are eager to turn the tables and note
that Mr. Obama’s White House fares only slightly better. A study
released in January showed that female White House staff members make on
average 88 cents for every dollar a male staff member earns.
The
dueling statistics reveal the political sensitivities around a set of
gender-related issues that could be critical in the midterm elections
this fall. Those include pay equity, family leave, preschool and child
care.
Mr.
Obama and his Democratic allies are trying to portray Republicans as
insensitive to the concerns of women, in the hopes of capitalizing on
the kind of lopsided female support that helped Mr. Obama win the White
House in 2008 and 2012. On Tuesday, Mr. Obama is to sign an executive
order barring federal contractors from penalizing employees who discuss
their compensation.
White House Pay
Most salaries for White House staff are set by a pay
schedule, but because more women occupy lower posts, the median salary
for female employees is $65,000 — nearly $9,000 less than the median for
men.
SALARY
MEN
WOMEN
NUMBER OF:
$50,000 or lower
62
78
$50-$70,000
46
51
$70-$100,000
43
42
$100-$150,000
53
44
$150,000 or higher
21
18
This
week, Democrats in the Senate are to begin considering the Paycheck
Fairness Act, which would add new regulations on how private companies
pay their employees. Democratic lawmakers are seeking to overcome an
expected Republican filibuster of the bill, which faces stiff opposition in the Republican-controlled House.
“The
more light you can shine on wages, the better,” said Heidi Hartmann,
the president of the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. “Who knows
how much stronger enforcement it will lead to. But I think the publicity
— the fact that people will hear about it and know about it — will
help.”
Even
as Mr. Obama seeks to make an issue of the gender gap in compensation
across the country, however, his own hiring is facing some scrutiny. The
recent study, by the conservative American Enterprise Institute,
showed that the median annual salary for women in the White House last
year was $65,000, while the median annual salary for men was $73,729.
The study was based on White House salary data.
The
pay in the White House most likely mirrors the situation across the
federal government, Ms. Hartmann said. “Women still tend to have lower
pay grades than men do, because the men, on average, have more years of
experience.”
Jay
Carney, the president’s press secretary, said the statistics for White
House staff members reflect the fact that women fill more lower-level
positions than men. But he said that women and men in the same positions
at the White House are paid the same, and that many of the women hold
senior positions.
“Men
and women in equivalent roles here earn equivalent salaries,” Mr.
Carney said. “Some of the most senior positions in the White House are
filled by women, including national security adviser, homeland security
adviser, White House counsel, communications director, senior adviser,
deputy chief of staff.”
He
said that the 88-cent statistic was misleading because it aggregates
the salaries of White House staff members at all levels, including the
lowest levels, where women outnumber men.
Brendan
Buck, a spokesman for House Speaker John A. Boehner, said the 77-cent
statistic that Mr. Obama has often cited was misleading for the same
reason, because it aggregates salaries for the American workforce. “The
wage gap is real, but the White House does itself a disservice — and
embarrasses itself in the process — by grasping for misleading
statistics that don’t tell the whole story,” Mr. Buck said.
Mr.
Boehner has long opposed new rules on equal pay, saying they are
unnecessary because existing laws already prohibit workplace
discrimination.
Mr.
Obama has come under sustained criticism for appointing more men than
women to his administration, though the gender breakdown of the White
House staff itself is about even.
A
study by the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers
University, for example, found that women make up 35 percent of the
president’s cabinet. Although that is one of the highest proportions
ever, it is down from the 41 percent hiring level during the Clinton
administration.
“For
men who are president, they have to make a conscious decision that they
want to bring new faces into the mix,” said Debbie Walsh, the director
of the Center for American Women and Politics. “It’s natural. And when
you’re the president of the United States, you want to be sure you can
trust the people around you, that you know them, and that you’ve had a
long-term relationship with them.”
Referring to Mr. Obama’s senior adviser, Ms. Walsh added, “That’s one of the reasons Valerie Jarrett is there.”
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