Gender wage inequality persists, study says

[elehhhhna]

Feb. 20, 2006, 1:27AM
Gender wage inequality persists, study says


By TERESA M. MCALEAVY
The Record

HACKENSACK, N.J. - The latest data on gender pay equity shows that little progress has been made in closing the gap between what men and women earn.

In this country, women make about 76 1/2 cents for every dollar men make for doing the same job. That's up from about 63 cents three decades ago.

"The fact is the gap has closed so little in the last 30 years that, at this rate, we'll catch up in a century," said Betty Spence, president of the National Association for Female Executives. "It's really disheartening."

The latest finding is from the group's annual salary survey, which was recently released. It looked at more than 100 jobs in 20 industries nationwide and found that in 2004, men earned more in all areas, including those professions where women tend to thrive.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/3668732.html

[MadMaddie]

1. Well it's not going to improve with...

the * Cabal in office. They don't think theres a problem with the gap!!

[Lindsay]

3. Yup - it's a good way to prove to women that they belong

at home. "See, ya can't earn as much as a man, so ya shouldn't even be there."

Reason #9,236,847,962 why I hate those people.

[Turn CO Blue]

2. Okay, so when I'm 141 yrs old, I'll earn the same as a man

employed in my same position. I'm glad to know we are making progress on equal pay, and it's worth waiting 100 years to catch up. :sarcasm:

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[niyad]

5. please cite proofs for these assertions--and explain HOW that justifies

paying anyone else less. and please show WHERE women actually get "months at a time" for child-rearing leave. I am sure many of the women on this board would love to know that.

did you just wander over here from freeperland?

[mongo]

6. Perhaps that accounts for some of the difference

but there is still a basic problem here of women getting paid less than men for the same work.

[Warpy]

7. That's total bullshit

The study covered wages for full time workers in all categories, not part time workers or workers out on disability (which is what maternity leave is, by the way, temporary unpaid disability leave).

Sounds like men need some bandaids for those guilty consciences about the way we women are being treated in this country.

[SharonAnn]

8. No, that's actually not true. The study takes that into consideration.

All my life I've worked. Never taken time off for anything. Usually the best performer in the group. Paid less than many of the men and longer between promotions. Higher education levels too.

It's gotten better in the last 40 years but it's still a problem.

[Solo_in_MD]

10. Are you sure about that?

I would want to see their data. For example, most teachers are paid on a rigid schedule. Hard to see how the stated disparity is correct within a district. Differences between districts would also be gender neutral. Same with commission sales.

[Yupster]

12. I was a teacher for ten years as well as being

on the district salary committee.

The district used a rigid gender neutral salary schedule based on years experience and education.

However, men always on average made more than women regardless of where you looked.

Take the average 40 year old male teacher's salary and the average 40 year old female teacher's salary. The average man made more. How could this be when they were both on the exact same salary schedule?

Compare 40 year old male and female teachers who all have master's degrees and what will you find? On average the males always make more. Why?

Because on average the 40 year old male teacher has a little bit more experience because some women take some years off for child-rearing. That doesn't mean all women, or even most women, but if you're talking averages, then if ten men worked ten years each and nine women worked ten years but the tenth woman took three years off, then on average the men will work more than the women and therefore on average have more experience and make more money.

Another difference we found was that even if there were relatively few male teachers on a campus, they were much more likely to do extra paid duties like coaching or teaching summer school. They wanted the extra money. Woman I'm sure wanted the extra money too, but more of them had family duties to get home when the kids were home so they had to decline more of those extras.

In some schools there is still the phenomena of men coaching the girls basketball teams. This is not because the principal wants a man to do it, but even with far more woman teachers in the school, he just can't get one to volunteer for the job.

This can be called discrimination since society expects the mother to be home with the kids while dad is doing extra work, but it's not really wage discrimination.

My own family is an acute example of this situation. When we met we were both teachers. We are exactly the same age, yet I always made more money. There were different reasons for it. I graduated in 3.5 years, she took 5.5. I went right into the classroom and she worked part time for an oil company for two years before going into teaching, so I was always a few years ahead on the salary scale. I got my master's a couple years before she did.

But then we had our kid and things got drastic. I quit teaching and got a job paying way more than a teacher. She went part-time. After two years part-time she quit paid work entirely. She hasn't worked in six years.

Just a few months ago she went back to work for the first time at a retail store for a few hours a few days a week. Last week she quit so she is not working again.

It may turn out that someday she may go back to teaching.

If she does she will have far fewer years experience than the average male teacher her age and will therefore make far less money.

Now I know that not every woman, or even most women areke my wife, but when you're talking averages it just takes one out of ten or even 100 to skew the statistics. If my wife went back to work as a teacher today, she would really move the numbers by all the years she took off. That's just the way arithmetic works.

I'm not saying there is not wage discrimination, but there are also very real and reasonable numbers for the wage disparities. I see them every day in my own family.

PS - I now work in a 100% commission job, and I see the same thing here. Because woman are expected to be home for their families, they are less likely to take promotions that require heavy travel. Also, we get to work our own hours, and if you call the office of a married woman, she is more likely to go home at 4 pm than a married man. It's just the truth, and the same for going back to work at night. All these things skew the numbers, and when you're talking averages even slight skews move the averages for everyone.

[Solo_in_MD]

14. So you agree that in teaching, identical quals, identical salary

which puts some of the assertions of the study in the OP in question.

I agree that there are greater household/childcare expectations of women that lessen their earnings. Also in the case of teachers (I too taught, and my wife still does) it is also a career that one can take time off of for child rearing and return to. Something not as easily done in other professions.

[Yupster]

15. The wage gap is made up of two parts

Pretty much everyone agrees with that.

Part one is the different family expectations and therefore work histories between men and women.

Part two is discrimination.

The fighting starts when you try to say how much of the gap is attributable to each part.

[obreaslan]

9. In reading some of your other posts in the last few minutes....

I'm just going to say :hi: and welcome to DU.

:popcorn:

[bostonbabs]

11. helllllooooo...ever heard of the Family Leave Act?

Clinton passed it ....it is for men and women.I was a senior vice president(21 years) of a public billion dollar company and your argument is hollow.Women earn less...period. Studies prove that women change jobs less than men do.....employee education/overturn costs much more than maternity leave.

[Montagnard]

13. ERA

It is not dead.