According to a 2019 report by the National Partnership for Women & Families, Black women earn 61 cents for each dollar a non-Hispanic white man earns. What does this “double gap” in wages that Black women experience, given both gender and racial wage gaps, mean for the African American community writ large? According to three different quantitative methodologies employed by Dr. Michelle Holder in her paper, “The Double Gap and the Bottom Line,” it means an annually reoccurring loss of $50 billion to the Black community in the U.S.

In a conversation moderated by Phela Townsend, a scholar-activist and a Ph.D. candidate in the Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations, Dr. Holder joins us to discuss what factors contribute to the “double gap,” and why it’s an important issue in the American economy.

Dr. Holder is an Assistant Professor of Economics at John Jay College, City University of New York. Prior to joining the John Jay faculty, she worked professionally as an economist for a decade in both the nonprofit and government sectors. Her research focuses on the Black community and women of color in the American labor market.