Little Diversity, Wide Wage Gaps: California’s Ten Largest Occupations

California's workforce is one of the most demographically diverse in the US. However, there is a pronounced lack of diversity within many occupations in the state. Across California's ten largest jobs, workers tend to be divided by gender, race/ethnicity, and place of birth. And these divisions, in turn, feed long-standing earning gaps amongst workers. Understanding these patterns is essential to creating effective strategies for broadening economic opportunity around the state.

Many jobs or tasks in California are disproportionately done by people with similar demographic backgrounds. This uneven distribution of workers (sometimes referred to as occupational segregation) is apparent across the ten largest jobs in the state, which together employ 20% of all California's full-time workers. For example, men make up just over half of the workforce, but more than 95% of drivers and construction laborers, while women make up about three quarters of registered nurses and elementary and middle school teachers.

Wages are also uneven across the state's ten largest occupations, consistent with educational or experience requirements and also influencing income gaps between demographic groups. Software developers, CEOs, and legislators, for example, typically make around $70 an hour, more than three times the median wage of construction laborers, drivers, and customer service representatives (around $20). Workers in those higher paying jobs are overwhelmingly white or Asian/Pacific Islander men. Those in the low-paying jobs are largely Latino men-except for customer service representatives, who are predominantly women and disproportionately Black. Meanwhile, immigrants are the majority among both software developers and construction laborers-reflecting the wide range of educational attainment among foreign-born Californians.

It is concerning that Latino, Black, and female workers are overrepresented in the lowest-paying of the state's major jobs and/or underrepresented in the high-paying jobs. While a host of decisions play into the jobs individuals land in, disparate opportunities and barriers in the labor market, in education, and in social support-some of which stem from historicalrace- and gender-based discrimination-also contribute. And while this means that these patterns will be complicated to address, California policymakers have a number of ways to open opportunity and mitigate adverse impacts.

Broadly speaking, policy can focus on the characteristics of jobs that workers already have, the opportunities workers have to choose career paths, or both. To address the characteristics of jobs, California policymakers have made pay and benefits priorities, such as by developing the California Earned Income Tax Credit and CalSavers retirement saving programs, increasing minimum wage, and expanding paid family leave. Meanwhile, the state makes substantial investments in education and workforce training programs to support skill-building and broader occupational choice for Californians. A master plan for career education is in development to strengthen career pathways and address structural barriers. Across the board, mitigating the variety of barriers to labor force participation and entrepreneurship-as well as improving access to skills and education-will be critical to widening the job prospects of California's diverse workforce.