Income Inequality in the Federal Civilian Government

An analysis of income inequality by race and sex within the federal civil service yields three findings of importance for income attainment and human capital research. First, large differences in salary between minority/sex groups remain after occupational stream and a number of employment-related variables are controlled. Second, institutionalized discrimination explains only one-half of these salary differences. Finally, within the federal civil service, the pay structures of minority and nonminority women are more similar to each other than are the pay structures of any other two groups of employees.