November 30 is Native American Women’s Equal Pay Day, which marks the date into a new year that a Native American woman must work in order to earn the same amount as a non-Hispanic white man’s annual pay. This is the second-largest race-and-gender pay gap, only to Latinas.
“Due to the long-lasting and devastating impacts of colonialism, genocide, and state-sanctioned violence, Native Women continue to face high rates of poverty, unemployment, and violence,” the Equal Rights Advocates write. “Recent data shows that the majority of Native American mothers are breadwinners for their families; yet with Native women earning about half the amount of non-Hispanic white men, it makes long-term economic security difficult for many families.”
The data suggests that this problem is getting worse. The Native Women’s Equal Pay Day was earlier in the year in 2021 and 2020, which demonstrates that it now takes even longer for Native and Indigenous women to earn the same amount as white men, on average.
These disparities lead to additional issues, including in benefits such as healthcare and retirement plans. According to a study by the National Partnership for Women and Families, “closing the pay gap for just one year would allow Native women … enough money to finance 28 months of childcare, three years of tuition and fees for a four-year university, nearly two and a half years of food for a family, and more.
Chabelli Carranza, a reporter on the economy, points out that the pay gap doesn’t even tell the full story. When a people have been faced with colonial-settler displacement and violence before being placed into schools to be more Americanized, they lose more than wages, she writes.
“Children were forced to go to boarding school, stripping their mothers of their roles as educators in the family. Mines on Navajo lands in the early 1900s created new jobs largely for men. And then in the 1930s, a program by the U.S. government … eliminated jobs and financial stability for the many Navajo women who owned and managed sheep herds.”
Carranza adds that there are few advanced jobs for Native women, or anyone, on the reservations, and despite some tribes having matrilineal cultures or other defined roles for women, they are often stripped of these by assimilation, like in the example of schools above. She also notes that data collection efforts around the living and working conditions for this community are not detailed enough to tell the full story. This is a key area where transparency must play a role at the employer’s end, driving visibility as an initial step toward driving equity.
The other major factor contributing to the pay gap is the high concentration of Native women in lower-paying hospitality and retail jobs, which typically also offer low upward mobility.
With more awareness, US policymakers, business leaders, and local governments must be made aware of the imperative to address these foundational inequities and the impact they have on pay and economic opportunity.
“Inequality did not just happen, we were targeted for our land and its resources,” says Gina Jackson, Co-Founder & Co-CEO of the Return to the Heart Foundation.
“Now here we are today fighting for equal pay as one of the many inequalities we face. It’s time for America to fully embrace its values and walk the walk on concepts including all [people] are created equal and strive for liberty and justice for all. Truly making efforts to close gaps on inequality will bring healing to our Nation.”
