Select Race and Gender
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While wages in the retail industry have dropped, the percentage of people of color in retail jobs has increased. Women of color doing this work consistently suffer the highest levels of poverty, and people of color typically work in the lower wage positions.
These unfair results aren’t natural, and they aren’t inevitable. We have the power to collectively create good jobs for all workers by supporting fair work practices. *
LEVEL OF POVERTY
Key Takeaways
- For more than 30 years, women of color consistently have had the highest poverty levels in the retail industry, with one in five living in poverty in 2012.
- Of all retail occupations, cashier and sales clerks have the worst poverty levels, and it’s more extreme for women than for men.
- Levels of poverty are increasing over time across all groups, but women and people of color continue to experience higher levels of poverty than white men. For more on this, see these reports by the Murphy Institute and RWDSU’s Retail Action Project: Discounted Jobs: How Retailers Sell Workers Short. and Short Shifted
Discover more by playing with the chart below.
What am I Looking At?
- More red means more poverty
Leading Questions?
Q: Which occupation has the highest poverty rate? (Click to see answer.)
A: Cashiers
Q: What happens to poverty levels when you click from mant to woman (on the total)? (Click to see answer.)
A: They increase.
RACE, GENDER, AND OCCUPATION
Key Takeaways
- People of color typically have the lower paid positions in the retail industry, such as clerks and cashiers.
- White men and women typically hold the higher paid positions of supervisors. For more on this,see this report by the Murphy Institute and RWDSU’s Retail Action Project: Discounted Jobs: How Retailers Sell Workers Short."
Discover more by playing with the chart below.
Select Gender
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What am I Looking At?
- The closer the two lines, the more equally people of color and whites are represented
- When the red line gets higher, it means the percentage of men or women of color in the industry/occupation is rising.
Leading Questions?
Q: What do you see when you click man/woman for cashiers? (Click to see answer.)
A: That people of color are becoming the majority in these low-paid positions
Q: What do you see when you click man/woman for supervisors? (Click to see answer.)
A: That white people are the majority in these higher-paid positions.
Worker Voices
What is your ideal reality, or how would you like to see the experience of workers in the restaurant industry change?
There should be… it should be easier for people to be promoted. That if you do well then you get promoted. It shouldn’t be that you work for a store for so long and you’re still a sales associate. And, I think if people got promoted more often and got those pay raises, you know, that gives people more incentive to even work even harder and to do their best at these jobs. But the reality is, you can work for there for years and you’ll still be in the same position, so.
Ayana - 24 - New York
I think if people got promoted more often and got those pay raises, you know, that gives people more incentive to even work even harder and to do their best at these jobs.
Hear the Whole Story
Ayana
24
New York
INCOME
Key Takeaways
- Women are the hardest hit by systemic discrimination in retail; they have the lowest wages. For example, in 2012, only 3% of white women and 2% of women of color earned $60,000 or more, compared to 4% of men of color and 11% of white men.
- While women of color have never made middle-class salaries in retail work, the industry as a whole is increasingly losing its ability to provide middle class salaries for most workers.
Discover more by playing with the chart below.
Select Year
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Correction: Previous versions of the Clocking-In website mislabeled the income data in the figure above. All other text and figures on this page were accurately presented. Please email us here with any questions/concerns. (Effective July 14, 2015 - 9:00pm EST.)
What am I Looking At?
- In percentage view:
- More red/orange = wages are lower
- Less red/orange = wages are higher
- When viewing years (1980-2012):
- If the bars are moving to the right, wages are decreasing;
- If the bars are moving to the left, wages are increasing.
Leading Questions?
Q: What shift do you see between 1980 and 2012 (for the total population)? (Click to see answer.)
A: Increase over time in all people earning less than $15,000/year.
Worker Voices
What is your ideal reality, or how would you like to see the experience of workers in the retail industry change?
Everyone should feel a sense of comfort, especially if you are in a city that houses, you know, different backgrounds, I feel that any store that you go into in a metropolitan city you should feel welcome. And everybody there, you know, should be happy to be working there, so of course the conditions should be fair for everybody. They should be getting fair pay where they be able to live and getting enough hours so they can provide for themselves and their family.
Anthony - 28 - New York
They should be getting fair pay where they be able to live and getting enough hours so they can provide for themselves and their family.
Hear the Whole Story
Anthony
28
New York