Women holding at least a bachelor’s degree now outnumber men, but when we look at the highest-paying industries, women are very much underrepresented. Not only are their employment levels low relative to their male counterparts, but women who work in those industries also earn much less than men even when accounting for occupation.
According to data from the US Census Bureau’s American Community Survey, people working in the securities industry have the highest average earnings, followed by workers in software publishing, other information services, computer manufacturing, and oil and gas extraction—all industries where the majority of employees are men. Of these high-paying industries, only in the securities industry are more than a third (36.5%) of the employees female.