In 1991, the United States government began efforts to address the “glass ceiling” and its effects on the federal workforce. This article explores the nature of the glass ceiling, particularly progress made since 1991 on the pay status and hierarchical placement of the almost 200,000 engineers in United States federal civilian employment. When a glass ceiling exists, men occupy a disproportionately high percentage of the higher ranks in a career field, while women tend to be overrepresented in its lower ranks. Similarly, on average men earn higher pay than women in the same organizational rank. These were exactly the conditions of the federal engineering field in 1991, the year of the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1991 that addressed the glass ceiling, among other topics. In 1991, as a result of the existence of the glass ceiling, women engineers earned only about 81% of the salaries and wages of their male counterparts. Through an exploration of federal employment databases, this article suggests that the condition of women engineers in government service has improved in the years since 1991—more female engineers are on the government rolls, they make up a much larger proportion of senior engineering management, and their compensation is much closer to parity with men—but they are not yet equal with males on any of these dimensions.