For decades, women have been fighting to level the playing field with men when it comes to how much they earn on the job, especially in Silicon Valley.
Local cities have some of the nation’s highest gender pay gaps, according to a recent report from TruckInfo.net, which compiled U.S. Census data comparing the median incomes of men and women in cities nationwide. Experts say the disparities vary by industry and are worse for women of color, with Latinas facing the biggest wage gap.
Of Santa Clara County’s 15 cities, the national report includes the six largest by population: San Jose, Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, Mountain View, Milpitas and Palo Alto. Women in San Jose rank fourth overall in the largest earnings gap for cities with populations greater than 350,000. They earn 72 cents to every dollar men earn. In Sunnyvale, which the report labeled a mid-sized city, the disparity is even wider, with women earning 56 cents to every dollar men earn.
Ann Skeet, senior director of leadership ethics at Santa Clara University Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, said the report shows the gender pay gap exists, even in female-dominated industries like registered nursing, where women are paid 90 cents to every dollar men earn.
“It tells us that it persists even in those job functions that are predominantly held by females,” Skeet told San José Spotlight.
A fact sheet from the Santa Clara County Office of Women’s Policy shows in California, Latinas are paid 44 cents to every dollar earned by white men. Native American women are paid 48 cents to every dollar earned by white men. In contrast, white and Asian women have the smallest pay gap, earning 80 cents to every dollar.
The county has looked for ways to help bridge the pay gap within its system. Cassandra Staff, program manager for the office of women’s policy, said they’ve signed the California Equal Pay Pledge and published a pay equity dashboard. The dashboard shows women working for the county are paid 17 cents more than men.
She credits the pay equality to the county’s transparency and high rates of unionization, which research has found helps close gender wage gaps. She said they’re creating more opportunities to support working women, such as a county program to hire women returning to the workforce after staying home with their families.
The nonprofit Hispanas Organized for Political Equality (HOPE) published a report in 2024 examining the economic status of Latinas in California, including the pay gap. The report found Latinas in the San Jose metropolitan area have the largest pay gap of any region in California, earning 33 cents for every dollar earned by white men. The San Jose metro area includes Santa Clara and San Benito counties.
“Desegregated data is really key to informing equitable policies on equitable workplace practices,” Maya Gomez-O’Cadiz, director of communications and research for HOPE, told San José Spotlight. “We can’t have a truly productive conversation unless we are looking at that, because the experiences are so vastly different.”
Gomez-O’Cadiz, who helped write the report, said private companies need to value combating inequality to help bridge the pay gap. For organizations looking to improve pay disparities, she said they can sign the equal pay pledge, conduct annual pay analyses based on gender and review their internal hiring and promotion practices, among others.
Closing the gender pay gap requires a culture shift alongside policy solutions. Angela Castillo, professor of sociology and women, gender and sexuality at San Jose State University, said there is progress being made to close the pay gap, but it’s slow moving because of the nuances associated with pay and intersections with race, sexual orientation, disability and many other factors.
“The gender pay gap is not isolated, it’s a reflection of sexism, it’s a reflection of a patriarchal society, it’s different based on race,” Castillo told San José Spotlight. “It’s a big question, how do we end sexism or racism, but that’s what we have to work toward to fix the gender pay gap.”
Contact B. Sakura Cannestra at sakura@sanjosespotlight.com or @SakuCannestra on X.
This story originally appeared in San José Spotlight.
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