For every dollar a man in Hawaiʻi makes, a woman makes 86 cents, according to a new study from the University of Hawaiʻi Economic Research Organization.
Hawaiʻi's wage gap was two cents lower than the national average.
About three-quarters of occupations in the state have a wage gap between men and women. The wage difference between men and women is larger for those in higher-paying jobs.
The report also found that women comprise 29% of people in the yearly earnings bracket of $160,000 and over.
UHERO research economist Rachel Inafuku said children are a main reason for the disparity in pay.
"Here in Hawaiʻi, mothers earn about 74% of what fathers earn in the labor market, whereas childless women make 99% of childless men's earnings. So we are finding that a lot of this is driven by motherhood, finding that upon the birth of their first child, women tend to, sort of like their earnings drop off a little bit in the labor market and then it never really fully recovers at the speed of that of men in similar education brackets and demographics and things like that," Inafuku said.
She said child care is important to ensure women have career opportunities to bounce back after giving birth.
Inafuku pointed to the state’s public preschool program as a step in the right direction.
But the Legislature did not pass several child care measures this year, such as one that would have increased wages for child care workers and another that would have created a paid family leave program.
