Actor Rich List Reveals Inherent Gender and Racial Inequality

A list of the world's highest paid actresses was released on Tuesday by Forbes, revealing the large gender and race pay gap within Hollywood.

ANALYSIS: The Gender-Wage Gap is Holding US Women Back

Jennifer Lawrence was the highest earning actress with US$46 million before tax, eclipsing the US$33 million earned by Melissa McCarthy over the last year.

But compared to actors, Lawrence's paycheck seems modest. For the third consecutive year, Robert Downey Jr. topped hollywood's richest, as he was paid US$80 million over the same period. Second ranked Jackie Chan was measured to earn US$50 million.

You have to go down to number four on the actors list to Bradley Cooper with US$41.5 million to find a male that is paid less than the top-earning actress.

Together, the world’s 10 highest-paid actors earned a combined total of US$64.5 million. But the top 10 women were only paid US$205 million combined. Forbes estimated that 90 percent of the world’s top paid actresses still supplement their on-screen pay with advertising endorsements.

From the actress list, 30 percent of the top earners came from outside the U.S., with Chinese actress Fan Bingbing coming in at number five with US$17 million and Indian Bollywood star, Deepika Padukone, listed tenth with US$10 million.

RELATED: #BlackWomen Equal Pay Highlights Race-Gender Wage Gap

From more than 11,000 on screen characters, only 33.5 percent were female. Actresses filled only 28.7 percent of all speaking roles in films, according to research from the Institute of Diversity and Empowerment at Annenberg, IDEA.

Female minority groups were also more likely to be sexualized than white actresses. Out of Forbes’ top 10 list no African-American or Latina women were included.

Pay inequality exists perhaps even more so in general society. In the U.S., women made only 70 percent of men’s salaries and white men earned almost twice as much as Latina women.