Women Trim Pay Gap With Men

Women cracked the 70% barrier in 1987 for the first time on record in narrowing a pay gap between themselves and men, the government reported today.

The median weekly earnings of men working full time rose $17--from $428 to $445--between the end of 1986 and the end of last year, while those of women climbed $13--from $296 to $309, the Labor Department said. In percentage terms, the median weekly earnings for women working full time in 1987 were 70% of those enjoyed by men, up from 69.2% in 1986 and 62.5% in 1979, when the Bureau of Labor Statistics first began collecting data on the wage differences.