Different life choices made by men and women, rather than sexual discrimination, account for most of the difference in pay between the sexes. Those choices have to do mainly with marriage, education and the type of work chosen. For example:

• The median annual earnings for a woman employed full time was 72 percent of men's pay last year.

• But among 27- to 33-year-olds who have never had children, women earn 98 percent of what men earn.

• A 1984 Census Bureau study found that while only 1.6 percent of a man's work years were spent out of the work force, 14.7 percent of a woman's were - an eightfold difference that results in more average work experience for men.

Compared to men, women often choose fields of study and careers that are less lucrative.

• In 1992, more than a third of the bachelor's degrees received by women were in the lower-paying liberal arts, while fewer than 4 percent were in engineering and mathematics and fewer than 1 percent in physical sciences.

• The largest category of bachelor's degrees earned by women was in business, at 20 percent, while 26 percent of men were awarded degrees in business and 13 percent in engineering.

• At the post-graduate level, 37 percent of master's degrees and 27 percent of doctorates conferred on women were in education, while 34 percent the master's degrees men received were in business and 22 percent were in engineering.

• Thus, one out of four women attaining doctorates did so in education, in which the mean (average) monthly income is $3,048, while one out of five men got doctorates in engineering, in which monthly income is $4,049.

The gender pay gap disappears when age, educational attainment, career choices and continuous time in the work force are factored in.

Source: Katherine Post and Michael Lynch, "Free Markets, Free Choices: Women in the Workforce," Pacific Research Institute Briefing, December 1995, Pacific Research Institute, 755 Sansome Street, Suite 450, San Francisco, CA 94111, (415) 989-0833.