There was a big to-do earlier this week when The New York Times reported that despite President Obama's condemnation of the gender wage gap, the White House had its own such problem. According to the Times, female staffers on average make 88 cents for every dollar male staffers do.
Yet a subsequent investigation by Susan Crabtree at The Washington Examiner determined that almost half of the 150 highest-paid White House staffers were women. Moreover, those senior women made on average about $8,000 more than men in the same tier.
The nuance in the White House numbers perfectly encapsulates why a conversation about the gender pay gap should not be reduced to single, quotable percentages. As our John Aziz explained this week, that removes important context and allows for significant misinformation.