tags: wage discrimination, sex discrimination, equal pay for women day, employment
Today is Equal Pay Day for women -- that happy day day when women's 2006 wages are equivalent to those earned by men in 2006 -- and 2007 is already one third of the way over!
But, you ask, these are modern times, aren't women paid the same as men, especially college-educated women? It might surprise you to learn that this is not true. According to a news report that I heard this morning on National Public Radio, women college grads begin their post-college careers by earning 80 cents for every dollar earned by men.
One year out of college, men and women should arguably be the least likely to show a gender pay gap, said a study published by the American Association of University Women (AAUW), since neither tend to be parents yet and they enter the work force without significant experience. However, pay inequalities were already apparent despite the fact that women outperformed men academically, and their grade point averages were higher on average in every college major.
"It surprised me that it was already apparent one year out of college, and that it widens over the first 10 years," Catherine Hill, AAUW director of research said.
Women even earned less than men in traditionally female-dominated fields: according to the study, women earned 95 percent as much as their male colleagues in education, while in math, women earned only 76 percent as much as men.
This wage disparity grows over time; within ten years, women trailed behind men by earning only 69 cents for every dollar that their male colleagues bring home. In fact, to match men's wages for 2006, women had to work from January 2007 to April 2007 -- an extra four months. In other words, a man must work five days a week for twelve months, whereas the woman working in the same position will have to work seven days a week for 16 months to earn equivalent wages.
This study found that the wage gap persisted despite accounting for such factors as the number of hours worked, occupations and parenthood.
The study asked; "If a woman and a man make the same choices, will they receive the same pay?"
"The answer is no. These unexplained gaps are evidence of discrimination, which remains a serious problem for women in the work force," it concluded.
AAUW Pay Equity Resource Kit [PDF]
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This study found that the wage gap persisted despite accounting for such factors as the number of hours worked, occupations and parenthood.
Do you have some links to those? I haven't been impressed with studies I've seen in the past. Also, ever heard of one that accounted for height? I recall seeing a study once that showed a significant correlation between height and income. Since women are on average, what, 6 inches shorter than men, doesn't it seem logical that this would be responsible for a significant difference in income all by itself?
From the AAUW Press Release:
So, the real figure hidden in the press release is the study concluded that only one quarter of the 20% gap between male earnings and female earnings was due to the difference in gender. It isn't really fair to use figures that haven't been corrected for the different occupations chosen by women, fewer hours worked, and other factors.
The real story is that, accounting for various factors, women still make only 95% of what men do straight out of college. And the unexplained part of the gap apparently grew larger later on, so there is still evidence of significant discrimination in pay, and that is unacceptable.
I just also think it is bad to pick and choose and lie with statistics in order to make a point :)
I'm not trying to be inflammatory here, just wondering. How are these studies typically conducted? I mean, some men don't get paid as well as other men. Are they comparing the average or mean wage among men in a certain discipline to the average or mean wage of women in the same discipline? What factors do these studies usually take into account when determining this?
Do you know if any research has been done on how the wage disparity gets introduced? Gone are the days (I hope, although I probably shouldn't be so optimistic) when you could blatantly give women less money for the exact same job in the exact same place.
I can think of several subtler ways to introduce bias: women could get hired more at lower paying companies or for lower paying positions, women could get denied promotions and bonuses more often, etc. Also, is the effect the result of most women earning a bit less than men in similar circumstances, or many earning about the same and a few earning drastically less?
Since those sorts of questions are on the individual, not group level, I imagine the research would be much harder to carry out, but it seems like it'd be more useful too, since as far as I know right now, we only have a vague sense that there's some sort of bias, not specific knowledge of where the best places to target first are.
Science Avenger: the PDF linked at the bottom of the piece is the source information that you want to read.
Spinfire: you have flunked your reading comprehension course. you even quote the study as saying; Even after controlling for hours, occupation, parenthood, and other factors known to affect earnings, the research indicates that one-quarter of the pay gap remains unexplained and is likely due to sex discrimination. Over time, the unexplained portion of the pay gap grows.
what part of that quote do you not understand?
Chad: they typically use average pay for period of time worked in each discipline. Most studies take into account the number of years worked and compare those directly with gender being the variable contrasted.
Matthew: i have no idea how a wage disparity gets introduced. i suspect that ll the factors you listed play a role in the gender wage disparity.
GrrlScientist, having dug through the article, I have to agree with spinfire.
The AAUW's study found that:
a) one year out of college, there's a 20% gap between women's earnings and men's earnings.
b) 3/4 of that gap goes away when controlling for hours, occupation, etc.
So, 1/4 of the gap (1/4 of 20% is 5%) is due directly to discrimination. Of course, that's still significant and important, but it's smaller than the headline seems to imply.
I find the fact that the portion that's directly attributable to discrimination increases with time to be more interesting and worrisome, actually.
I'm not sure what part of the quote you think I misunderstood. Perhaps you could point it out?
The quote I took from the press release indicates that after accounting for factors such as hours worked, differing occupations, etc, one quarter of the wage gap remained. Therefore there are two numbers in the report:
WITHOUT accounting for factors such as differences in the number of hours worked, different occupations, etc, women make 80% of what men do.
The quote from the study says that after adjusting for those factors, one quarter of the gap remained. This means that if you look at same occupation, same number of hours worked, etc, women make 95% of what men do.
Ultimately the second number is the fair one to use since it corrects for the fact that women tend to choose to work different fields as well as the fact that, statistically, they tend to work fewer hours. It isn't fair to compare as equivalent the earnings people who are working different amounts!
Maybe I am just misunderstanding what you are saying. But my complaint with the press release is that it brings up the big 20% gap at the top and then buries the less impressive statistic after correction further down.
I absolutely trust the conclusion that there are biases in pay, and as I said, that is unacceptable. The report's statement that both the pay gap *and* the unexplained portion of it grow over time is a much more significant and disturbing conclusion.
So the wage gap goes away when you correct for hours and occupation. Does that mean that this amount of the gap cannot be attributed to discrimination? Are you kidding me? How many women get mommy-tracked, have to work part-time to care for children, give up excellent jobs to move when their husband gets a better job somewhere else, only to take a pay cut or leave the workforce entirely?
Have you ever heard of someone getting "daddy-tracked"?
Discrimination isn't always blatant; in many cases it's the default.
The AAUW study did claim to correct for "parenthood" as one of the known factors, but since I haven't read the whole thing I'm not exactly sure what that entailed. The initial statistic given in the study also refers to one year out of college, when parenthood is less likely to be a factor.
I think you can divide causes of the pay gap into factors which are under the control of the employee and factors which are not. I think the out-of-employee-control factors are more disturbing as they represent a direct bias on the part of the employer. The decision to have children is still a decision between an employee and their spouse - so if a mother or father works fewer hours because they have kids you really can't blame the employer (although an employer could still respond inappropriately by cutting pay disproportionately, etc).
Have you ever heard of someone getting "daddy-tracked"?
Yes, many times. I think if you search around you'll find that it happens frequently. And sometimes it is even worse for men who choose to be the "stay at home dad" because employers don't expect that from men. Society does not look highly at the stay-at-home-dad and people assume that they simply couldn't get another "real" job and being a full time dad is just code for unemployment. In my field (computer science) people are less likely to get hired if they are merely *married* and might have children, even though that is technically illegal (and that includes men).
The fact is, whether you are male or female, if your life goal is making as much money as possible, you probably shouldn't get married or have kids :) Personally I would rather balance a career and parenthood, even though it is clearly the more difficult path.
Don't interpret what I'm saying as trying to belittle the fact that women make less because of parenthood. Unfortunately, every time people bring up these issues they frame them in terms of women being discriminated against when the real problem is parents being discriminated against. Because the issue has previously been presented as a gender issue, men face tremendous stigma against choosing parenthood over their careers.
I think the real problem is that people tend to look at gender roles in society as being discrimination "against men" or "against women" when the real problem is that society has certain expected roles for both men and women. When people have the courage to break from those roles, they are perceived negatively, regardless of their gender.
Obviously the whole issue of fair compensation is extremely complex, and I have departed from the initial discussion. My apologies.
Thanks Grrl. I will read the link later today when I have more time. In the meantime, am I the only one wondering if 95% is as good as we can expect, even if there were no discrimination? After all, there are some jobs where it is perfectly justified for one gender to be paid more than the other. Think NBA vs WNBA. There are jobs where women rightly outearn men as well, such as fashion model. However there seem to be far more favoring the men, because of the frequent relevancy of physical strength.
I'm not saying I know these account for the 5% gap, but isn't it a little pollyanish to assume it is possible to get to 0%? Put another way, given there are many jobs which objectly favor men over women, what overall percentile differential should be the realistic goal?
if i recall correctly, single women also earned less than men in the same job, although this disparity was less than for women with children or married women, so the parenthood issue is not necessarily the issue. further, black and hispanic women were affected even more strongly by this wage bias, after controlling for age, time on the job, marital status, children, etc., so this is not only an issue regarding gender, but also gender and race.
unfortunately, i do not have the original studies, so i cannot look at the data, but i do have their PDF (linked above) and have to take their word for their methods.
as far as jobs that favor women, Science Avenger, i am guessing that being a professional lap dancer pays women better than men -- but that's only a guess.
Hooray for professional lap dancers!
As with others who've commented here, I'd really like to see how they "controlled for" various wage-affecting issues. And for those that doubt you can just blatantly underpay women, there are still plenty of ways to do so in the corporate world. Lower ranking job titles, lack of specific college degrees or certifications and even a low credit score are all perfectly legitimate fallback excuses when someone complains about their pay. It's especially easy to underpay someone when you don't have to disclose how much money other employees make and you can be reasonably assured that they'll not disclose that information either.
Does it happen men as well? Sure, but chances are good it happens to women more often.
Seems to me the simplest explanation of the disparity is that women just aren't as productive as men. Maybe that's because they aren't as good at math.
How does maternity leave affect these calculations?
I would also like an explanation of the point spinfire isn't grasping.
I think the real problem is that people tend to look at gender roles in society as being discrimination "against men" or "against women" when the real problem is that society has certain expected roles for both men and women. When people have the courage to break from those roles, they are perceived negatively, regardless of their gender.
Spinfire...this is the very definition of discrimination.
For a very good analysis of the forms that pay discrimination takes, read Getting Even by Evelyn Murphy.
I assume you're being ironic...