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Post by hrhunter on Apr 18, 2016 4:13:20 GMT
Although it has been shown that women (on average) receive about 77% of the salary that men earn, the reasons for this have been argued over for the past couple years. Some people believe that women's unequal pay is due to them picking careers that have lower salaries, whereas others believe that this is an act of gender discrimination towards females. There's an article on Forbes.com ( here) that goes into detail about the first side of the debate I mentioned, and I'll sum it up if you don't feel like reading it. The article states that wage gap statistic is only a reflection of "the median earnings of all men and women classified as full-time workers." This means that it is not comparing a man and a woman who have the same job, rather it is a comparison of women and men's wages in general. In the article, evidence is shown that women tend to work less hours than men, contributing to them receiving a smaller income. It is also illustrated that women tend to pick jobs with regular hours, comfortable conditions, and ones that allow for greater personal fulfillment (which all tend to be lower paying jobs). Lastly it is brought up that children play a role in the jobs' that women pick, because if a women has a child, they are likely to pick careers that a kid friendly (shorter hours, more time off, close to home, etc.) Not a part of the article, but something that my Econ 1 professor brought up: if gender discrimination did exist in the work place and women did receive a lower wage doing the same exact job that men do, wouldn't employers only hire women to save money? (Just something to think about!) Here is an article that takes the other side of the argument, and I'll sum this one up for you guys as well. The first part of the article has evidence that shows men receive more money their first year out of college than women, a time in which both genders should easily make comparable earnings (women usually do not have kids yet and they are both just as inexperienced in their line of work). Their next point provides evidence that shows that women earn less in almost every single job category that the Bureau of Labor tracks, meaning that even if women gravitated to lower paying jobs, men are probably still receiving higher wages in those fields as well. Lastly, the article points out that the U.S. makes it increasingly hard for women to work and be a caretaker for their children at the same time due to lack of paid family leave and child care assistance. TL;DRSome people attribute the wage gap to women, in general, having lower paid careers. Others say the wage gap is due to on-the-job gender discrimination. What side of the debate do you guys take? If you do not feel like writing out a response, feel free to answer the poll  I'd love to know where you guys stand on this debate! |
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rkipp
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Post by rkipp on Apr 19, 2016 21:59:55 GMT
I believe the wage gap is due to on-the-job gender discrimination given the magnitudes of evidence that support this statement. To refute your article's point regarding the idea that women seem to earn lower wages due to the jobs they pursue, I found interesting statistics that demonstrate how that is not always the case. www.americanprogress.org/issues/women/news/2015/04/14/110959/how-the-gender-wage-gap-differs-by-occupation/The article states, "...male surgeons earn 37.76 percent more per week than their female counterparts. In real terms, this means that a female surgeon earns $756 less per week than her male colleague, which adds up to nearly $40,000 over the course of one year. And this does not apply only to high-paying, male-dominated careers: Women are 94.6 percent of all secretaries and administrative assistants, yet they earn 84.5 percent of what their male counterparts earn per week—a weekly difference of $126." Thus, there is clearly a gender discrimination occurring here, no matter the job. In addition, if the wage gap was merely a matter of women taking lower paying jobs, then how would one explain the fact that more women are obtaining college degrees than men (also discussed in the article above) and are pursuing jobs in the medical field or becoming a lawyer, yet still getting paid less? I believe this is a huge issue in society and I really liked your post! |
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Post by melody7song on Apr 20, 2016 0:15:20 GMT
I think this is a great point and I really like your open-ended, objective presentation of this topic. I am sure that women may tend to gravitate towards lower-paying jobs....but only sometimes. I wrote about this earlier in the quarter when I moderated, and it was interesting how even us women unconsciously perpetuate the stereotypes that we so despise. We unconsciously bias against ourselves, unconsciously set lower standards for ourselves, and unconsciously stereotype other women. Yet even so, I strongly believe that the wage gap is much more than this unconscious bias or of women unconsciously seeking out lower-paying jobs. One factor could be that women are discouraged by rejection after rejection from companies who are biased against females and who believe men do a better job. Another concern is that women may feel threatened or sexually vulnerable in some of these higher-paying companies. But gender discrimination in the workplace is certainly not an issue women can overcome simply by changing their mindset and finding higher-paying jobs that they may not be as comfortable or confident with. It's an issue that needs both men and women to participate in. This video is not as relevant to the workplace issue, but it is a great one about how men are clearly needed to overcome gender discrimination once and for all. www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-xqeTvD3as |
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Post by aroloff on Apr 20, 2016 3:27:02 GMT
Why not both? I suppose this is kind of a cop out answer, but it seems to me to be closest to the truth, that the wage gap or whatever you wish to call it is in part due to the kinds of careers and hours that women tend to seek (on average), and part of it is due to bias (whether conscious or unconscious) against women in the workplace.
Something has always bugged me about this question, however, and that is how can you obtain accurate measurements for this phenomenon? The fact is that no two people (male nor female) do exactly the same kind of work; it seems to be to be an oversimplification of the workplace to say, for example, that female surgeons make less than male surgeons, because no two surgeons work the same (as in, the actual work they perform is not the same, even though their job titles are the same). The first article you linked to brings this up, kind of.
I guess what I'm saying is that the wage gap is too complex a phenomenon, too difficult to truly grasp and analyse with the data at hand, that it seems kind of pointless to try, at least until we have more complete data to study. Although, maybe I'm totally wrong. It's clear that there is a wage gap, even if the causes are unknown, and perhaps we could stumble across a potential solution while working with the kind of information we already have.
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Post by rebeccah on Apr 20, 2016 4:40:04 GMT
It seems to me that the main reason for the gender gap is due to discrimination,. There is simply too much supporting data for me to think otherwise. This gender discrimination is subtle, but does definitely occur, maybe even subconsciously. I believe most people who are guilty of this don't realize their own reasoning behind it because the inferiority of women has been engrained in their heads since birth, but the fact is, it's still present. In regards to why all employers don't hire women (cheaper wages), it is the same mindset. Women are thought of as inferior whether we're consciously aware of it or not and employers obviously want whatever is best for their own business (which is the superior candidate). As someone previously said, there are a number of other inequalities between men and women in society, especially legal issues. Many politicians will even readily admit that they think women simply do not deserve to earn as much as men. The Paycheck Fairness Act was introduced in 2014 and has continually been blocked by a Republican Congress, showing that enough people in politics do not believe in equal pay, based solely on gender. (If you want to learn more about it, the act is outlined here: www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/senate-bill/84 ). Additionally, according to Forbes' list of top ten highest paid CEOs, all 10 of them are men. Now to be fair, there is a significantly higher number of male CEOs, but this fact still seems a little odd to me... |
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Post by larissa on Apr 20, 2016 5:38:56 GMT
I believe this is due to gender discrimination as well. I took gender studies fall quarter and one of our readings was regarding the increase of men in what is considered female heavy occupations such as nursing. USA today mentioned that, However, although the women clearly outnumber the men, the case is that women are still being treated inferior because men are receiving a higher pay. Therefore, the wage gap is not centered on the type of professions that women gravitate to. Rather, the "Glass Escalator" effect, shows that men are enjoying higher wages and faster promotions from female dominated professions.  |
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Post by cliffordzhang on Apr 20, 2016 17:18:17 GMT
Great discussion guys, but remember it's very easy to become biased just based off our very own gender and bringing emotions into the mix. It's also very easy to find and be swayed by only the data you want to see on the internet. If I google "there is no gender discrimination" I will only see articles that support that claim. But if I google "there is gender discrimination", I will only see articles claiming the opposite. That's not Google's fault, it's just how search engines are designed. www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNH0bmYT7osLook I found a video of a woman claiming that air conditioning is sexist. It must be true. |
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Post by jinghuang on Apr 20, 2016 17:34:00 GMT
Although I am leaning towards the argument that wage differences are caused by gender discrimination rather than women seeking for lower paying jobs, I believe that it is still a combination of both in addition to societal norms that contribute to the problem. I think both arguments tie in closely with what our society expects of us based on our gender.
One can argue that because it has been the norm for so long that men are regarded as more capable, it is hard for our society to adapt to a new set of expectations on the unconscious level. I actually conducted a social survey in China during the summer after my junior year, and asked people some questions regarding their personal societal views. In short, people of the older generations admitted that they would employ males over females even if they had the same work experiences/degrees, just because "men are usually more involved in the workforce while women worked at home".
Similarly, because that social norm still surfaces in today's society, women tend to follow as well. Collectively, women do tend to participate less in higher paying occupations because some jobs have a sort of stigma attached that it would be odd for women to pursue it. Therefore ultimately, I think it is due to older social norms that still have its traces in today's society combined with the nature of humans that it is hard for us to adapt change (especially in regards to a mindset that has been previously established) that the wage problem still exists.
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Post by hrhunter on Apr 21, 2016 19:41:26 GMT
After seeing your guys' replies, I definitely think there is much more evidence backing up the gender discrimination theory behind the wage gap. Although both theories probably have a bit of impact on the wage gap, like a lot of you guys said, there is just so much evidence pointing to women being paid less in the exact same job fields. The article I had read on Forbes completely disregarded this fact when making their observations, making their article (to me, at least) less reliable. However I still am a bit skeptical though, due to the fact that the economy has the invisible hand leading people to make the most financially savvy decisions. And if this is true, women should be getting hired much more than men, seeing as their salaries are less and easier to pay for. Maybe our country has so much gender discrimination that they think that men are much better skilled, so their higher salaries are worth paying for? I'm probably thinking too much about this haha.
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I'd love to know where you guys stand on this debate! 