Categories
10 Things

Top Paying Jobs for Women

Laurie Anderson released the song “BEAUTIFUL RED DRESS” (from her album Strange Angels) in 1989. Some of the lyrics included these lines:

well they say women shouldn’t be the president
cause they go crazy from time to time
well push my button baby here I am
yeah look out baby I’m at high tide

I’ve got a beautiful red dress
and you’d look really good standing beside it..

ok! ok! hold it! I just want to say something
you know, for every dollar a man makes a woman makes 63 cents
now, fifty years ago that was 62 cents.
so, with that kind of luck,
it’ll be the year 3,888 before we make a buck

 

Beautiful Red Dress, from Strange Angels
Beautiful Red Dress, from Strange Angels

According to a recent issue of Forbes magazine, women are now making 82 cents for every dollar that a man makes.  In other words, Laurie Anderson may have been exaggerating slightly on when she expected women to equal men in earning power, but she wasn’t exactly lying.  If her figures were accurate for 1989, then women’s earning power has gained (roughly) a penny a year for the past 20 years.

If the trend from the past 20 years continues, we should see salary equality between men and women in the year 2030.

But there are some INDUSTRIES THAT ARE MORE WOMEN-FRIENDLY than others, where women can out-earn men on salary.

Here’s a list of the Top Ten Jobs for Women from that list.  (You’ll want to click through the above link to see jobs #11-#20)

  • Pharmacist
  • Lawyer
  • Computer / MIS
  • Physician / Surgeon
  • Chief Executive Officer
  • Nurse Practitioner
  • Software Developer
  • Operations Research Analyst
  • Human Resource Manager
  • Psychologist

So women – if you really want to make money and close that earnings gap fast, you’ll want to consider jumping into one of these 20 career paths.  Let’s see if we can reach that equality time sometime before 2030.