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Women of Generation X in the labor force

May 09, 2002

Women who were 25 to 34 years old in 2000 had a markedly different relationship to the labor market than did their counterparts in the 1970s.

Labor force participation rates of women and men aged 25-34, 1975 and 2000
[Chart data—TXT]

Among the differences between young women in the 1970s and in 2000:

  • About three-quarters of women aged 25-34 participated in the labor force in the year 2000, compared with a little more than half in 1975.
  • Young women today are more highly educated than were their counterparts in 1975; in 2000, 30 percent of women 25-34 years old had completed 4 or more years of college, compared with 18 percent in 1975.
  • Young women have substantially closed the earnings gap with young men since 1979 (the first year for which comparable data are available); they earned 82 percent as much as men in 2000 for full-time work, compared with 68 percent in 1979.

These data are a product of the Current Population Survey. For more information, see "The labor force experience of women from 'Generation X'," by Marisa DiNatale and Stephanie Boraas, Monthly Labor Review, March 2002.

SUGGESTED CITATION

Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, The Economics Daily, Women of Generation X in the labor force at https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2002/may/wk1/art04.htm (visited March 28, 2024).

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