How to Win the Battle of the Sexes Over Pay (Hint: It Isn’t Simple.)
Published to The New York Times on November 10, 2017
When Billie Jean King won the United States Open singles tennis title in 1972, her reward was a meager $10,000. Ilie Nastase, her male counterpart, won $25,000.
Ms. King fought hard for equal rights and, on the tennis court, she won. By 1973, mean and women received the same prizes at the Open. That still can’t be said of all tennis tournaments, but despite some ill-natured male grousing recently, equal pay is still the rule, at the United States Open, at least.
That is not the reality in the overall labor market, however, where women still earn less than men, and there is considerable confusion about the reason for the gender earnings gap, and what can be done to eliminate it.