--- title: Gender Pay Gap and Grades: Female A Students Make Less Than Male C Students description: More bad news about the gender pay gap canonical: https://time.com/110443/grades-gender-pay-gap/ author: Eliana Dockterman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-05-23T16:54:20.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:42:57.486Z og:title: Gender Pay Gap and Grades: Female A Students Make Less Than Male C Students og:description: More bad news about the gender pay gap og:url: https://time.com/110443/grades-gender-pay-gap/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Gender Pay Gap and Grades: Female A Students Make Less Than Male C Students twitter:description: More bad news about the gender pay gap twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # Female 'A' Students End Up Making Less Than Male 'C' Students  by [Eliana Dockterman](https://time.com/author/eliana-dockterman/)  ## Eliana Dockterman Correspondent May 23, 2014 4:54 PM UTC  by [Eliana Dockterman](https://time.com/author/eliana-dockterman/)  ## Eliana Dockterman Correspondent May 23, 2014 4:54 PM UTC Your performance in high school is key to predicting your future salary. But so is your gender and race. The higher the grade point average (GPA) you have in high school, the more money you’ll make later in life, [according to a new University of Miami study](http://www.as.miami.edu/news/news-archive/your-high-school-gpa-could-affect-your-income.html) that will be published in the upcoming issue of the Eastern Economic Journal. But high-achieving female students still won’t earn as much as male counterparts who didn’t work quite as hard: a woman who had a 4.0 GPA in high school still makes less on average than a man who had a 2.5 GPA. The chart below illustrates the earnings differences between men and women. The men are in red, the women in green. Personal earnings are listed on the X-axis, high school GPA on the Y-axis.  Michael French, the University of Miami The gender pay gap has been [hotly debated](http://time.com/76023/pay-gap-gender-kids-allowances/), with some attributing it to job choice, child rearing issues or just plain discrimination. And the issue has recently become more contentious as disputes over [how wide the gap actually is](http://ideas.time.com/2013/03/07/the-pay-gap-is-not-as-bad-as-you-and-sheryl-sandberg-think/) continue to grow. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/110443/grades-gender-pay-gap/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/110443/grades-gender-pay-gap/"},"headline":"Female 'A' Students End Up Making Less Than Male 'C' Students","datePublished":"2014-05-23T16:54:20.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:42:57.486Z","description":"High school GPA is just one of many factors, including gender, that determine a student’s future income, according to a new study. It found that women who had a 4.0 GPA in high school still made less on average than men who had a 2.5 GPA","url":"https://time.com/110443/grades-gender-pay-gap/","keywords":["Living","Education","High School","gender pay gap","pay gap"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Eliana Dockterman","jobTitle":"Correspondent","url":"https://time.com/author/eliana-dockterman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-living/","name":"Living"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/110443/grades-gender-pay-gap/","name":"Female 'A' Students End Up Making Less Than Male 'C' Students"}}]}] ```