New long-term study shows smaller wage gap for clergy

In the past three decades, many clergy have experienced significant increases in income even as their work weeks declined by more than 15 percent, according to a major new study of clergy compensation.

Overall, in inflation-adjusted wages, non-Catholic clergy made $4.37 more per hour in 2013 than they did in 1983. That figure is more than double the wage increase of the average worker with a college degree.

Like most workers in this age of increasing economic inequality, clergy are continuing to fall financially behind elite professionals such as doctors, lawyers, and hedge fund managers, the study found.