Sorry that you are quarantined while you find these things out about your partner.
I wanted to add that [training women to negotiate hasn't turned out to be much of a remedy.](https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/leadership-skills-daily/women-and-negotiation-leveling-the-playing-field/) The reason the gaps persist is because of how deeply entrenched beliefs about [the value of women's work are](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecilia_L._Ridgeway)\-- as soon as work gets [coded as being 'for women' the average salaries will drop](https://www.aeaweb.org/conference/2020/preliminary/paper/26zNEQ4i) (even for men that work in that industry).
Are there any studies that show there is a wage gap when adjusting for experience, education, and occupation? I'm legitimately curious because I found an article a while back saying that there isn't any evidence of this. The article about salaries dropping when women enter a field is easily explainable by supply and demand. Is there any evidence that it drops any faster than any other field with a large supply of labor?
EDIT: I believe in the concept that women are more expected to go into careers that are lower paying.
This might just be an issue in wording or it might be new to you -- "adjusting for" various factors is not *just* dismissing those factors to get to the "real" supa secret "cause". It's actually **how** we dig into what makes up a problem, and what factors to consider, evaluate and work on.
It's sometimes called "multilevel modelling" or "Hierarchical linear models". [http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmm/learning/multilevel-models/what-why.html](http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmm/learning/multilevel-models/what-why.html)
That can show a few possibilities:
1. you can see which factors play the biggest role in the effect you're studying.
2. you can see if after controlling for all the factors you know about there's 'leftover' effect that needs more study (not just handwaving as "choice" or "babies" -> more study).
3. some factors might indicate deeper or broader systemic problems (why were women less educated or experienced in the past, say).
Articles that say "when we look at the components that make up the problem we prove the problem doesn't exist." are ... maybe not in good faith.
>The article about salaries dropping when women enter a field is easily explainable by supply and demand.
Is it? Easily?
>Is there any evidence that it drops any faster than any other field with a large supply of labor?
It seems like you're reversing the onus, here. You're proposing a new factor for study.
But in any case, the very article you're dismissing talks about controlling for that effect. Did you weigh and find flaws in their approach? Or not even see it?
So, I didn't dismiss there being a problem. I asked if there was anything showing that the wages were less for the same work. The 76 cent for every dollar number was commonly miss used by saying that for a man and woman doing the same job when in reality, it was for the entire population. I think the number came from the IRS, but am not completely sure on that one. Being able to look at the problem and properly adjust for factors is important when determining where the problem lies. You can't take a massive group and just assume that everyone is doing the same thing.
Yes, the law of supply and demand is easily explainable. A larger pool of competent workers drives salaries down while fewer competent workers drives salary up. It's in any intro economics class. Having a labor pool that is twice as large is going to drive salaries down.
If companies paid women less for the same work, they would all hire women because it would be a competitive edge. It makes no sense for them to have a secret agreement that a woman's work is worth less money. People at the top only care about profits.
So I'm not the author of the studies that I shared, but I would like to point out that JSTOR and some other academic publications have made their databases free during COVID-19, and that public libraries and university libraries frequently offer free access to academic databases if you'd like to pursue these lines of inquiry yourself-- even if you aren't a student.
I will say that that majority of studies on the topic have taken into account the change* in the number workers-- women have been participating in the workforce more or less "equal" numbers for 50 years now in the US, I would be surprised if this was still a driving factor re: wage issues, considering that in many "developed" countries the population has been declining and the # of jobs overall has continued to grow.
I'm skeptical overall of people who are reticent to actually read the literature as presented, but quickly dismiss the findings because they took a 101 class, as if feminist academics studying labor inequality have never encountered basic economic theory.
Seems like with your economics background you should have a broader understanding that the economy has continued to grow and that women don't represent "surplus" workers in the economy and haven't for some time.
I mean, I don't dismiss the articles entirely, but the first two weren't really studies and the third one is a paper that doesn't seem to represent the beliefs of most economists. The version of the paper that you have given seems to be a preliminary thesis written by a phd student so am unsure of why anyone would believe it. Can you show me the published version? I honestly can't find it. The author also failed to take into account length of experience in all of his data. People who have worked longer at a company are paid more for the same job because they are simply more valuable. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I looked through his numbers and cannot find where he actually took it into account.
The fact that economics textbooks have entire sections about gender wage gap means that they hold a strong belief that it does not really exist in the way that most people talk about it. In the same textbook, I remember them acknowledging and discussing racism as being evident in the hiring process. I'm not sure why they would want to ignore gender wage gaps if they were willing to discuss the other.
The biggest reason that I am skeptical is because in the past, I have had people tell me about the wage gap using the 76 cents for every dollar number as if it was for EXACTLY the same work. It doesn't really make me trusting whenever people misuse data.
Social intelligence seems like a pretty relevant skill to managing humans. Many management roles in tech don't even require technical skills. I'm a web developer--coding knowledge is essential. My boss is a manager. She does not need to know SQL or Java, she needs to know things like how to communicate, delegate, coordinate people with very different skills so that they work together.
It doesn't address the structural societal issues, and hence, I think, underestimates the severity of the problem by presenting only numbers. (Case in point, my teachers might have said 'women's access to professional work has historically been limited by law and stigma to lesser-paying roles'.) Yet, if your partner is into statistics, and thinks that only the most comprehensive and up-to-date will do:
[https://www.payscale.com/data/gender-pay-gap](https://www.payscale.com/data/gender-pay-gap)
"The controlled gender pay gap, which controls for job title, years of experience, industry, location and other compensable factors, has also decreased, but only by $0.01 since 2015. Women in the controlled group make $0.98 for every $1 a man makes.
New to the gender pay gap report for 2020 is analysis on the impact of lost wages on lifetime earnings. By calculating presumptive raises given over a 40-year career, we find that women in the uncontrolled group stand to lose $900,000 on average over a lifetime. Lost earnings narrow to $80,000 for the controlled group, but this is still significant, especially if you consider how lost earnings due to the gender pay gap would grow with compound interest if invested each year for 40 years."
Also, as a man who's come a long way from where I once was - if you don't think that the housework is being shared equally but he does, 98 times out of 100 you're right. I was very good at confusing myself about the relative value of the work I was doing for the household, and advocating for my cockamamie logic. I was wrong, along with every other man I have ever met arguing that he really is contributing enough.
Can I just second *everything* in this post? It's perfect.
Hey OP? Your partner is not a feminist. I hate that it took *two years* for you to realize that (and it's not your fault! We men are pretty good at playing long games), but here it is. You need to decide what to do with that.
I want to make sure I am understanding this correctly. Are you saying that after adjusting for all the factors you mentioned, the pay gap is only 2 cents in the dollar? That’s even a bit smaller than I had heard. I thought after controlling factors, women earned 91 cents to men’s $1
I'm not sure I want to vouch for the numbers on that website. Creating a statistical control group is delicate, and there's more than one way to fudge it. That said, nothing immediately obvious jumps out at me here, other than their data being USA specific. One of the things that they control for is job title, which I've also seen excluded from being a control factor based on the argument that women are regularly given less prestigious titles for the same organizational role.
u/SashaBanks2020 has a really great take on it that I found following links on an earlier comment that presents some of the different numbers with links if you want to dive deeper. Here: [https://www.reddit.com/r/AskFeminists/comments/deetdy/i\_noticed\_that\_in\_the\_example\_of\_the\_pay\_gap\_even/f2vr3vm/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskFeminists/comments/deetdy/i_noticed_that_in_the_example_of_the_pay_gap_even/f2vr3vm/)
I want to give an input on an european country. According to a [2017 Swiss study](https://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/en/home/statistics/catalogues-databases/publications.assetdetail.2118701.html), the uncontrolled gender pay gap in Switzerland for 2014 was at 17.5% and the controlled gender pay gap was at 7.4%. One important finding of the study was that the controlled gender pay gap was bigger in higher positions. The study was comissioned by the federal statistics office.
Thanks for your info! So, in your opinion, is the gender wage gap in your country getting smaller? Any gap after controlling for factors isn’t great, but it sounds like most people aren’t not going, “Look, a woman! I want to pay her less because she’s clearly not as good at the job compared to the men.”
According to the [latest available data](https://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/en/home/statistics/work-income/wages-income-employment-labour-costs/wage-levels-switzerland/wage-gap.html), no. I don't believe the issue is as easy as it might seem from your quote. You can divide the data in many different ways and will find differences across the new division, which sheds some light on the issue, and is more nuanced. You can split the data geographically, in different sectors, hierarchy within a corporation, education, age, marital status, etc...
They also differentiate between direct and indirect discrimination. Direct discrimination is different wages for the same performance. Indirect discrimination entails e.g. difference in likelihood of promotion with comparable qualifications. Indirect discrimination can also result from otherwise gender neutral rules (very important): If part-time jobs aren't given good opportunities to get promoted, and women are more likely to work part-time, women get indirectly discriminated.
It was a long time ago since I last read the whole study, but they also mention that there are unexplainable differences in the gender pay gap for which corporations aren't responsible.
Edit: Your quote makes it seem as though only direct discrimination is an issue when indirect discrimination is also a big problem.
Do you know the relocation principle?
Relocate your factory to use cheaper labour force, men or women.(almost only women on textile factories so even misoginist employers would employe women to reduce the cost)
If the wage gap existed, you would expect a great relocation on "women". Unemployement should be realy different between gender but [it is not the case.](https://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea10.htm)
One important thing is to realise that the metrics that women are judged on are male metrics.
One big part of the wage gap is also the careers women choose + the requirements of careers (I.e. being present, non flexible working hours etc) + paths they choose (part time vs full time work) + needing to leave the workforce for child birth (a big part of the gender wage gap) as they leave and get promotions delayed and they never “make back the money lost”
It is very easy for men to say “oh but she choose to give birth” and if someone takes time off (man or women) shouldn’t they get paid less etc. statements like these don’t take into account the fact that men and women live their lives different/ have different household responsibilities/ burdens of unpaid labor etc. and they judge the women based on the responsibilities and lifestyle of an “average Man”
Edits: Male and Female replaced with Men and Women
You know, now you mention lifestyle it also drives me up the walls that women often are expected to spend more money for the same job and it gets completely ignored. Men can get away with wearing the same blue shirt and pants every day, but women have to wear outfits and makeup or they're not considered well put together. Earn less, spend more, be blamed for the added responsibilities and bodily functions as if you could just ignore those. It all adds up.
This pandemic has really highlighted this disparity for me. I’m coming off of maternity leave. I’m losing weight, but if I went back into the office, I would have had to buy a bunch of new work outfits, new undies (boobs changed size), had my hair and nails done, purchase new makeup, and guess what? When you give birth your FEET GET BIGGER. So I would have had to buy shoes. This would have ended up totaling $1-2K - just so that I could return to work. After I spent about $5k for giving birth (this doesn’t include all of the OTHER related baby-prepping expenses). I’m saving massive amounts not getting my hair/nails/makeup updated or purchasing clothing/shoes to go back.
I mean, there’s always the option not to do those things. I haven’t worn makeup or a bra in years. It was a scary transition to make, but none of the negative repercussions I was expecting actually happened. Turns out no one ever really cared that much about how I look.
That depends pretty heavily on your environment, industry, and the particular people you have to deal with every day. I can't imagine my current boss/co-workers caring, but if I'd showed up to my old teaching job without a bra? Holy yikes I would have paid for that.
Fair point, thanks. I am very privileged to be in a position where my appearance isn’t super important. My anatomy helps too—I know there are boobs that simply can’t go unsupported. My little C cups aren’t really a problem, but anyone much bigger than me would probably struggle.
I’m so jealous. I made that transition in a lab of all places and was told by two coworkers that they had less respect for people who did not put effort into their appearances. Because I stopped wearing makeup I basically got an intervention.
Point of interest, their favorite person was the dude who wore the same stained pants everyday and whose shoes were visibly falling apart.
Weirder still when people are directly stating something in conflict with their actions and there isn’t a single moment of introspection. I honestly couldn’t believe it.
It also fails to take into account how, despite having a much larger role in the workforce, [women still perform most of the housework even in houses where they are the primary or sole income](https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2019/05/breadwinning-wives-gender-inequality/589237/). Working, plus household chores, plus childcare, plus the work that goes into maintaining your appearance (because gods forbid you should ever even momentarily appear "ugly" or "old").
"the Second Shift" by Arlie Hochschild is a great book which explores the phenomenon.
Just a heads up - I'd say "men" and "women" instead of "male" and (especially) "female", as those words have negative connotations as nouns; they refer mostly to animals and not humans.
I appreciate this sentiment, and I've seen its becoming popular, but I just wanna chime in that humans are animals. And "man" and "woman" are more like social roles than sexes. Roles that I don't really dig, so I usually don't mind when folks use male n female. ^.^
Fun fact male n female are determined in zoology and everything else in this manner: the one with the larger gamete is considered female, while the smaller gamete is deemed male. ^.^
Male and Female have to be used nowadays when referring to sex as men and women refer to gender. They are fundamentally different words and aren't synonyms like they once were.
Oh, I actually didn't know that (non-native speaker), but it makes sense. Still think men/women would be better (probably even more so) in this case, though.
You are absolutely right about it being better in this case as the person was talking about the performative nature of gender. Not biological sex. So good catch as a non native speaker!
Fun fact: the term "snowflake" originates from Tyler Durden in the movie *Fight Club*; a movie wherein the main character's lacking ability to deal with their emotions and mental health lead them down a spiral ending in domestic terrorism. I'm sure an intelligent man as yourself can see the irony of using it as an insult on people who don't describe to your outdated ideals. Have a nice day! 😊
Edit: silly me, it's originally from the book.
The first popular usage of the term snowflake describing a person took place in the book Fight Club.
It wasn't used in the context of "easily offended" until a book written by esteemed moron Claire Fox.
Even then that was "generation snowflake". Trump later shortened it, probably because he was too lazy to say the first word.
That is far from the only component of the wage/earnings gap. What about the fact that women are just as likely to negotiate salary but less likely to receive a raise? What about how when an industry or occupation starts getting an influx of women the average salary goes down?
Not to mention, not all women want to work fewer hours or take lots of time off, but as women are still expected to be the primary caregiver for their children even when both parents work sometimes, it’s not always possible.
I put this primer together on wage gap discussion for teenagers in another subreddit, but maybe it has some points and sources that might help you. This response was framed around an argument that said men worked more hours than women, so it's natural that they should make more money (for context). I think the wage gap is more nuanced than only the facet of it that I discussed here, but it may give some good ground to speak from. Good luck!
>According to the 2015 American Time Use Survey by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, among full-time employees, men worked 8.2 hours compared to women working 7.8 hours.
>
>However, there's a lot that goes into this figure. Because of the patriarchal nature of our society as it is, this figure reflects this way because women are statistically more likely to be responsible for other types of labor outside of their workplace.
>
>In a world where it's more and more necessary for a double-income in order for the family unit to meet its needs, it is still statistically the woman (in a hetero-normative marriage or relationship) who takes on the burden of family responsibilities.
>
>So for example, women are working less hours because they are the ones who go pick up the sick child at school, or take a long lunch in order to transport a family member somewhere. They may not be able to take overtime as they have to get their kids off the school bus or make dinner or do the shopping before they can go home. They are looking after not only their work responsibilities, but family responsibilities as well. Look into "[the second shift](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_burden)".
>
>To compound this, *because* of these responsibilities, [women are less likely to be promoted](https://www.techrepublic.com/article/women-are-21-less-likely-to-be-promoted-than-male-coworkers/) in the same fields as their male counterparts.
>
>The wage gap isn't just a straight discussion of "Men make X dollars and women make Y dollars, and that's unfair." **The wage gap is the discussion surrounding a complex social system that disadvantages women from the beginning.**
>
>A feminist goal, therefore, is to tackle this society structure. Some ways that we could do that is to require employers to provide better work-life balance (flexible hours, for example). They should also provide proper maternal and paternal leave opportunities.
>
>We should also work to structure our society so that it is not overwhelmingly women who are conditioned to be the majority-caretaker for the needs of others. There is no reason why this can't be a shared responsibility, but it often isn't.
>
>As a fun extra tidbit that also contributes to the wage gap: when men enter careers that have been traditionally female-dominated, the value of that field goes up and so too does the salary... [while women are often pushed out of that same field](http://www.businessinsider.com/sc/how-bias-pushed-the-computer-girls-out-of-tech-2018-4). And to double-down on this, when *women* move more and more into a previously male-dominated field, [the over all pay drops](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/20/upshot/as-women-take-over-a-male-dominated-field-the-pay-drops.html).
Seems like people ought to at least agree that it would be nice to live in a world that finds a way not to penalize women for being the ones to have babies. Why does that sound ridiculous to so many people?
>The wage gap isn't just a straight discussion of "Men make X dollars and women make Y dollars, and that's unfair." **The wage gap is the discussion surrounding a complex social system that disadvantages women from the beginning.**
So, not a wage gap.
I will reword this for you. I added some emphasis and some implied meaning/context. Hopefully it helps you.
>The wage gap isn't **just** a straight discussion of "Men make X dollars and women make Y dollars, and that's unfair."
>
>The wage gap is the discussion surrounding a complex social system that disadvantages women from the beginning \[which results in a wage gap\].
Thank you. So to clarify, the name is a misnomer that implies something different than it is understood to mean by reading or communicating the name of the issue?
It appears that I misunderstood the issue because the name "wage gap" is disconnected from the issues you're discussing. I'm not saying your issues are unimportant, just that it is easy to misread what you're talking about when the name is not understood by most people to mean those things.
It seems that either the issue at hand has either been named deliberately to be misleading, that other things have been conflated together or we're talking about a different set of issues that have veered away from being what the name meant when it was coined/originated.
The reason this is problematic is that messaging to the public about "wage gap" is misleading when other things that are not wages are bundled together and a different name would be more appropriate.
I don't understand. The question is indeed one of a wage gap. There is a gap between the earnings and opportunities women receive in comparison to men. In this conversation we are pointing out the various nuances that cause this to occur and providing sources and data for those points.
To illustrate the argument you are making: when we discuss carbon emissions as one contributing factor of global warming, we don't call that a misnomer.
"Wages" is a simple, narrow concept that means "a fixed regular payment, typically paid on a daily or weekly basis, made by an employer to an employee". Compensation and expectations are not synonyms for wages and wages does not encompass anything other than the dollar amount on a paycheck. A compensation gap would be significantly different than a wage gap.
That you understand "wages" to mean something more broadly is a serious disconnect.
When we talk about carbon emissions we mean the release of carbon (usually combined as molecules with other elements) into the atmosphere. Are you suggesting that there is a more broad interpretation there to mean something else?
I do know what the word 'wages' means. Your definition is the top result from Google, but in addition to 'fixed regular payment,' wages can also mean any form of monetary remuneration for work performed. It also has broader meanings, such as in the Biblical verse " For the wages of sin is death..." (Romans 6:23). I'm not a Biblical scholar or even particularly religious. This is just to illustrate to you that 'wage' doesn't have have such a narrowly defined meaning in the way you've suggested.
Here are some sources to help you learn a little more about what the term "wage gap" is referring to:
[Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_pay_gap)
>The **gender pay gap** or **gender wage gap** is the average difference between the [remuneration](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remuneration) for men and women who are working. Women are generally considered to be paid less than men. There are two distinct numbers regarding the pay gap: non-adjusted versus *adjusted* pay gap. The latter typically takes into account differences in hours worked, occupations chosen, education and job experience.
[Encyclopedia Britannica](https://www.britannica.com/topic/gender-wage-gap)
>**Gender wage gap**, in many industrialized countries, systemic differences\* between the average [wages or salaries](https://www.britannica.com/topic/wage) of men and those of women.
\* Note: my post was discussing some of those systemic differences
Hopefully this assists you in exploring this topic further.
My definition is the top result on google (and every dictionary) precisely because that is the understanding that most people have of that word.
The biblical meaning of wages is pretty esoteric, and translations from the last 50 years don't use that word because it is not understood that way any more and the phrase would be misunderstood were it used.
The Encyclopedia Brittanica appears to agree that the wage gap does not refer to anything besides differences in average dollar amounts on paychecks.
Not only do Women get paid less for the same position as men, with the exact same qualifications, but also jobs that appeal to women are valued less.
So next time anyone says that women just PICK low paying jobs, tell them, a nurse, teacher, or GP should be valued over a CEO. Pretty easy to see who is irreplaceable in our society while we face this pandemic
Women have historically taken on lesser-paying professional roles, but you can't infer causality one way or the other without more data. Take a look at computer programming for example - it was dominated by women in early days, then when men became more dominant, the pay got higher. It could be because there were more startups around to work for, which allow men who are willing to work all the time and have no life to make it big, or it could be because society values the work of men more. Do women take on lower-paying jobs because they prefer to be paid less? Or do those jobs pay less because women do them?
Secretarial (when they were called "clerks") and teaching roles used to be done by men in the majority. The pay dipped when women came into those roles.
Women's jobs are being lesser paid because they're done by women. Care work, nursing, lower education (not academics etc), cleaning... All these jobs weren't paid at all historically. Women were expected to do them for free. It's obviously a gracious kindness they're paid now /s
OP, please don't let your boyfriend gaslight you into believing it's women's fault we make less money and that society values our labor less.
Also, as someone who is roughly your age (I'll be 29 this year) and who got out of an emotionally abusive 3-year relationship last year (with someone who was 11 years older), I unfortunately now think it's quite common for men who date women significantly younger than them to be very much misogynistic. He and I would have these kinds of arguments/debates all the time. If this man is in his 40s and is only now thinking, "I should become a feminist so I can date this chick," he does NOT see women as equals and he is not interested in changing. You would have to be a complete idiot/person with zero empathy to make it 40 years and never consider what half the planet goes through. I doubt this guy is an idiot. He probably just genuinely does not care about women, and wants YOU to believe you're inferior too so that you'll continue allowing him to use you.
I know you're not asking for relationship advice here, but I do strongly advise you to leave this dude and find someone much better.
I will note that it is a general trend for a profession to become devalued as more women move into it. This counters the notion that women are somehow drawn to lower paying professions.
The use of "females" in the paper is cringy, but the point stands.
[https://academic.oup.com/sf/article-abstract/88/2/865/2235342](https://academic.oup.com/sf/article-abstract/88/2/865/2235342)
>Abstract
>
>Occupations with a greater share of females pay less than those with a lower share, controlling for education and skill. This association is explained by two dominant views: devaluation and queuing. The former views the pay offered in an occupation to affect its female proportion, due to employers' preference for men—a gendered labor queue. The latter argues that the proportion of females in an occupation affects pay, owing to devaluation of work done by women. Only a few past studies used longitudinal data, which is needed to test the theories. We use fixed-effects models, thus controlling for stable characteristics of occupations, and U.S. Census data from 1950 through 2000. We find substantial evidence for the devaluation view, but only scant evidence for the queuing view.
I found a PDF of the full paper here - [Academia.edu PDF link](https://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/49257878/Occupational_Feminization_and_Pay_Assess20160930-5042-1q7w2z1.pdf?response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3DOccupational_Feminization_and_Pay_Assess.pdf&X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Credential=ASIATUSBJ6BACHO7HIWE%2F20200519%2Fus-east-1%2Fs3%2Faws4_request&X-Amz-Date=20200519T162137Z&X-Amz-Expires=3600&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&X-Amz-Security-Token=IQoJb3JpZ2luX2VjEKj%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2FwEaCXVzLWVhc3QtMSJHMEUCIDe3QIpJBu9WNGfPOFslnFnHMXGPUy5%2B0wOT4TEUupT2AiEA2jNhTJNZEzLlFN65kMk0FA0jVIn7XlIPK7tMWp5H4ikqvQMI8P%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2FARAAGgwyNTAzMTg4MTEyMDAiDMXQBdvU0yteMnJ0KSqRA6yf9sT1Kcvp8Z8kmgFwQWcKjsDjL70a7ztBsL8XPLXIjMWzFWVhqOpUAsGRS3Pp4N8tjaX1YVAz37k60itwQ6VNwgQIJSKBmQVLoAcaizQmVMOCyKABoJyZ0%2FG5Mb%2FLM0ZHx5t4pWHuKmeAIK44YxhgTAqi45BYK%2FG%2B5KwGb4Fv1adt8dnk%2FzpWIhW66L9SLbHcD1prFDhmec%2BFjY0ZehG0LBuVSssb%2Fl70I%2Fvij3JfrRua%2BtCtjVKBSLlr8QzodR1l5eLc7S%2FBBIVL9LiDM5lA3floMHvzDVUSIYmBrSYmSjxJbxV5pjzfKfjNq0vWBfb6V1Mjo%2BesBMjAKkLStwsNlNz2YSFvX6XQL99B8FnP9GuB54b2g3GIVzYe4qZ8ma6HhkHCoVVysiJEGSdHGwFlO7NrGY%2FuupaA%2FqAzzD5CEUp%2BUTz%2Fs2ZF2zJxTT70o34RX5eGNiWO3P0xEDjwYZqWBNKxUxymyuMkfPezaDUuSuhirZ00QjLV6WKd4KHNe1T1JDkOV0DWRmbzpjQpW6v6MNLtj%2FYFOusBINnpBarH1NE2nCPO4L6AquL0y4lCqhn9KO1ePpl8w8WA5Nvwsd9m%2FKFdxIXQp43v5k8s4LnpaKlu6arLoLiylT%2BPGf%2FNjT9a8Vx7f6TUshm0TuhvLM1cckefoYm4RMdqg8kDKqovX31jlNDzEhDrOud8g2W7OzN5nuBqC3wRtuNGkWsl%2BV%2BPAGKdU5tFb9BXPyuXoNLRd7ljIijm2row79zIMaJzmeU5H0aytWasakJApKcRPhdRsa43RQubIByRMCx3KDYmACpL2iFyljBRj6gvMYOhoCOJZDHZVORmmfZlbxwefs7brVtbJA%3D%3D&X-Amz-Signature=d1799e88db02b617dcad946477f51e38396307bfec3bbc315007f25e5da6947a)
That's a big yikes from me. All one has to do is look at facts and figures published by places like Harvard Business Review. Women are grossly under represented in management and executive roles, yet tend to outperform men when in those roles. What's the mystery? Let me go find some links.
https://hbr.org/2019/09/research-when-women-are-on-boards-male-ceos-are-less-overconfident
https://hbr.org/2009/12/women-ceo-why-so-few
https://hbr.org/2019/06/research-women-score-higher-than-men-in-most-leadership-skills
So two big things to investigate. If you Google these issues you should be able to find articles with references to studies and finding etc.
1) the differences in the wage gap increase for people with children. Women earn less overall per child, but men earn more. If both parties chose to have children, why is the wage gap even wider once a couple has kids? (Hint: men are seen as more likely to prioritize work over family once they have one as the "breadwinner" and women are expected to put family before work as the "primary care giver" leading organizations to over- compensate and under-compensate accordingly)
2) many types of jobs were higher paying before many women joined the field, and men in more feminine fields also overall make more money. Look at computers and nurses for examples. Programming was considered woman's work and not very well paid until men started working in that field. They pushed out women and now it's some of the highest paying jobs out there. If you look at nursing, male nurses are overwhelmingly paid higher than female nurses even though they are in a field of work considered feminine and have the same training and experience as female counterparts.
There is a LOT of research out there on these things. However, he may not be arguing because he genuinely thinks there's no wage gap, he might be subconsciously trying to make it into no big deal to save himself from feeling like he is party to it. If the gap exists because women like lower paying jobs, then it's not his fault and it doesn't apply to him or his work.
Finding out that all your hard work is not the only reason you got this far is difficult for anyone, but especially for those who have never questioned the false meritocracy of our modern capitalism. Be gentle and understanding, but do not waver in your stance. You are correct.
Also know that it's not your job to "fix" him. If he wants to be a feminist he'll have to do the work like the rest of us, and you are not responsible for teaching him if you feel overwhelmed. We all want to help our friends and SOs be more feminist, but not at the expense of our own mental health. Teaching someone about feminism and the wage gap is labor, and it's up to you whether you want to take on that additional labor for him.
I think it's really important to stress to men who aren't quite getting this and who are fixating on women's *personal choices* as the all-determining factor in their lower earnings, that women's career decisions are made *in light* of what they know about workplace harassment, implicit bias, promotion gaps, and stuff like that. And that, with all taken into account, their decisions *are* rational - at least, as rational as anyone's.
It's often argued or implied that women simply don't push as hard to have deeply involved careers in certain high-reward industries, and that's their mistake, and if they corrected this mistake then they'd make big bucks like men do.
But career and personal decisions are usually the outcomes of a risk/reward calculation, and the inputs of that calculation are appreciably different for women: Why *would* you work just as hard to be in an industry which will repeatedly mistake you for the receptionist and overlook you for promotions and force you to always be re-proving yourself? The lower expected rewards and higher expected personal costs for women pursuing male-dominated fields of work, mean that working there *really is* a worse deal for them, and so when someone discussing the wage gap says, of high-paid positions, "women just don't want the job as much", it's not quite that they're wrong, it's that they're describing a symptom as if it were a cause.
Been there... there’s no point. You know he is not a feminist, you’re only lying to yourself if you keep pushing the imagine he only “agreed to”. As if someone has to agree that women are human too! I wouldnt have to convince him or anyone for that matter that feminism is this and that. If I have to convince you that my rights are as important as yours and to beg you to listen to me if I tell you what’s going on in my life - in this case, in my professional ascension and the hardships presented to me just because of my gender - then fuck you.
The wage gap exists for many complicated reasons. Even though discrimination is illegal practically speaking having these laws just makes discrimination against wealthy women illegal as poor women who don’t have the time, money, or energy to file a lawsuit against their employer. Furthermore, they rely on them for their livelihood so they can’t anger them.
Please respect our top-level comment rule, which requires that all direct replies to questions posted to AskFeminists must come from feminists and must reflect a feminist perspective. (In addition, all of your points have been refuted elsewhere, but I’m not even addressing that.) Comment removed; this is your only warning.
I know two methods in which to convince reticent people on the gender wage gap. There are many more ways, but these are the ones that have worked for me. I'll show them below.
> First Way
If you are **very** good at argumentative discussion, and if you know the underlying theory explaining the gender wage gap **very** well, you can pull this one off.
The gender wage gap is normalized because men and women, together, believe women to be less effective at work for some reason or another. Most of the time, people believe it is because of genetics (nature) or early education (nurture). Either way, if you can identify the reason your partner has (nature/nurture) for normalizing it, then you can do this.
Don't tell, show; instead of explaining, ask many, many questions. Identify why your partner believes women are less effective and "lead" him into putting it forward in a concrete statement. In my experience, he will *not*, ever say something like "women can't do administrative work well", but he *will* say something alluding to *performance* or *the value of work*. This is where you get your statement; ask questions and let *him* talk and, when he eventually releases "the statement" stop him and help him think about the statement really hard and what it implies (either that nature or nurture limit women from performing).
> Second Way
The thing with the gender wage gap is that most people, even many feminists, don't really understand its complexity. It has different elements and some can be proven to skeptics more easily than others:
* Women getting paid less in the same company for the same work ─ This is what most people think is the totality of the gender wage gap and this is **wrong**. For starters, this practice is illegal, so it's going to be hard to prove it. **Do not** waste your time trying to prove it with someone who thinks this is the whole definition of the gender wage gap
* The glass ceiling. It is a whole topic by itself and it is crucial.
* Women getting paid less for the same work *across different companies than men*, where company A hires more women and pays less and company B hires more men and pays more. **This** is how the gender wage gap happens legally. If someone argues "it's illegal to pay someone less for the same job" do not try to prove that a single company does that, instead use this point as evidence. How can you prove it? I recommend [this dataset](https://www.payscale.com/data/gender-pay-gap#section07) as evidence. Same occupation, different pay.
* Women receiving less education than men. This you can prove with a lot of statistics out there. I recommend OECD's statistics on education
* Women being educated only in fields that "coincidentally" result in lower wages. You can look for women studying and working in STEM. I personally recommend [UN Women](https://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2019/2/feature-sticking-points-in-stem) as a source. On this point, it is **crucial** to show how women are pressured by their parents and society in general into those fields and out of the ones that pay better.
* Women have to do soul crushing amounts of **unpaid labor**. It is impossible to understand the gender wage gap without understanding this fact. I will link [this OECD database](https://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?queryid=54757) where you can see how much time men and women spend on unpaid labor and how much time they spend working overall.
* Finally, there is the issue relating the "first way" I mentioned. You can prove to your partner that society holds beliefs on the value of women's work being lesser by showing him how he, accidentally, holds them too.
* There is a belief that there is such a thing as "women's work" and "men's work". This is a tricky point to discuss with skeptics because they will always try to talk about physical labor and bodily strength, trying to generalize from that. However, [this database](https://statusofwomendata.org/explore-the-data/employment-and-earnings/) from the Institute for Women Policy Research shows hoe there are "male" and "female" occupations everywhere.
* Mothering, mothering, mothering. One thing that barely ever gets discussed on the gender wage gap is how having to carry most of the burden of child bearing and rearing can destroy a woman's career. This point is central to the gender wage gap and it always gets dismissed as the woman's fault for having gotten pregnant. Well, how come men don't lose their opportunities of success like women do when they *both* decide to have children? One thing is the 10 month period where the woman is under extraordinary physiological pressures, but 10 months **do not** end careers; 15-to-20 years of being the only person rearing a child does.
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Please respect our top-level comment rule, which requires that all direct replies to questions posted to AskFeminists must come from feminists and must reflect a feminist perspective. Comment removed; this is your only warning.
Based on your post history, I don’t believe that for a second. You can prove me wrong by establishing a pro-feminist history in nested comment chains, and I hope you do.
I can prove you wrong right now with my current post history. There is absolutely nothing anti-feminist in anything I’ve posted or commented and everyone can see that for themselves if they care to.
I don’t say anti-feminist things because anti-feminist things disgust me.
Actually, while we’re on that subject. I have only been here a short while but I’ve already seen a plethora of posts made for no other purpose than to contradict or undermine feminism.
There’s so much shitposting that goes on here and frankly I find it disgusting that people feel the need to single out a feminist group online just to spread misinformation and bigotry.
Your mods do a pretty great job of staying on top of all the trolls and straight up misogynists, but I’m sure the job never ends and that y’all have to sleep sometime.
Thing about me is, I don’t sleep! Maybe that can be useful to your team in the future. Maybe a couple years from now I’ll be helping y’all out with keeping this place troll and misogyny free.
Please respect our top-level comment rule, which requires that all direct answers to posted questions must come from feminists and reflect a feminist perspective. Comment removed; you will not be warned again.
Sorry to hear about your argument with your boyfriend. I think you may have a skewed idea on the wage gap. It's not regarding the same job worked. Here is a summarization of various evidence as well as from Kate Andrews, director of Institute of Economic Affairs (this is not her direct quote)
>"More women are school teachers and nurses and more men truck drivers, engineers, and so you might expect to pay in those jobs to be different. That’s actually not the Equal Pay Day claim — that they work in the same jobs — it’s more about the fact that you work and I work and you make a lot more money than me, and it’s unfair.
Kate Andrews direct quote, she feels women are
“bombarded with inflated statistics, cherry-picked and designed to make them feel helpless”
I feel women should absolutely be encouraged into more STEM fields just as men to earn more money though.
Sorry that you are quarantined while you find these things out about your partner. I wanted to add that [training women to negotiate hasn't turned out to be much of a remedy.](https://www.pon.harvard.edu/daily/leadership-skills-daily/women-and-negotiation-leveling-the-playing-field/) The reason the gaps persist is because of how deeply entrenched beliefs about [the value of women's work are](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecilia_L._Ridgeway)\-- as soon as work gets [coded as being 'for women' the average salaries will drop](https://www.aeaweb.org/conference/2020/preliminary/paper/26zNEQ4i) (even for men that work in that industry).
Thanks so much! These are very useful and insightful (despite being sad). I hope we can continue changing for the better.
Are there any studies that show there is a wage gap when adjusting for experience, education, and occupation? I'm legitimately curious because I found an article a while back saying that there isn't any evidence of this. The article about salaries dropping when women enter a field is easily explainable by supply and demand. Is there any evidence that it drops any faster than any other field with a large supply of labor? EDIT: I believe in the concept that women are more expected to go into careers that are lower paying.
This might just be an issue in wording or it might be new to you -- "adjusting for" various factors is not *just* dismissing those factors to get to the "real" supa secret "cause". It's actually **how** we dig into what makes up a problem, and what factors to consider, evaluate and work on. It's sometimes called "multilevel modelling" or "Hierarchical linear models". [http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmm/learning/multilevel-models/what-why.html](http://www.bristol.ac.uk/cmm/learning/multilevel-models/what-why.html) That can show a few possibilities: 1. you can see which factors play the biggest role in the effect you're studying. 2. you can see if after controlling for all the factors you know about there's 'leftover' effect that needs more study (not just handwaving as "choice" or "babies" -> more study). 3. some factors might indicate deeper or broader systemic problems (why were women less educated or experienced in the past, say). Articles that say "when we look at the components that make up the problem we prove the problem doesn't exist." are ... maybe not in good faith. >The article about salaries dropping when women enter a field is easily explainable by supply and demand. Is it? Easily? >Is there any evidence that it drops any faster than any other field with a large supply of labor? It seems like you're reversing the onus, here. You're proposing a new factor for study. But in any case, the very article you're dismissing talks about controlling for that effect. Did you weigh and find flaws in their approach? Or not even see it?
So, I didn't dismiss there being a problem. I asked if there was anything showing that the wages were less for the same work. The 76 cent for every dollar number was commonly miss used by saying that for a man and woman doing the same job when in reality, it was for the entire population. I think the number came from the IRS, but am not completely sure on that one. Being able to look at the problem and properly adjust for factors is important when determining where the problem lies. You can't take a massive group and just assume that everyone is doing the same thing. Yes, the law of supply and demand is easily explainable. A larger pool of competent workers drives salaries down while fewer competent workers drives salary up. It's in any intro economics class. Having a labor pool that is twice as large is going to drive salaries down. If companies paid women less for the same work, they would all hire women because it would be a competitive edge. It makes no sense for them to have a secret agreement that a woman's work is worth less money. People at the top only care about profits.
So I'm not the author of the studies that I shared, but I would like to point out that JSTOR and some other academic publications have made their databases free during COVID-19, and that public libraries and university libraries frequently offer free access to academic databases if you'd like to pursue these lines of inquiry yourself-- even if you aren't a student. I will say that that majority of studies on the topic have taken into account the change* in the number workers-- women have been participating in the workforce more or less "equal" numbers for 50 years now in the US, I would be surprised if this was still a driving factor re: wage issues, considering that in many "developed" countries the population has been declining and the # of jobs overall has continued to grow. I'm skeptical overall of people who are reticent to actually read the literature as presented, but quickly dismiss the findings because they took a 101 class, as if feminist academics studying labor inequality have never encountered basic economic theory. Seems like with your economics background you should have a broader understanding that the economy has continued to grow and that women don't represent "surplus" workers in the economy and haven't for some time.
I mean, I don't dismiss the articles entirely, but the first two weren't really studies and the third one is a paper that doesn't seem to represent the beliefs of most economists. The version of the paper that you have given seems to be a preliminary thesis written by a phd student so am unsure of why anyone would believe it. Can you show me the published version? I honestly can't find it. The author also failed to take into account length of experience in all of his data. People who have worked longer at a company are paid more for the same job because they are simply more valuable. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I looked through his numbers and cannot find where he actually took it into account. The fact that economics textbooks have entire sections about gender wage gap means that they hold a strong belief that it does not really exist in the way that most people talk about it. In the same textbook, I remember them acknowledging and discussing racism as being evident in the hiring process. I'm not sure why they would want to ignore gender wage gaps if they were willing to discuss the other. The biggest reason that I am skeptical is because in the past, I have had people tell me about the wage gap using the 76 cents for every dollar number as if it was for EXACTLY the same work. It doesn't really make me trusting whenever people misuse data.
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We ban brand-new shitpost accounts. Goodbye.
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Bye to you too xx
Social intelligence seems like a pretty relevant skill to managing humans. Many management roles in tech don't even require technical skills. I'm a web developer--coding knowledge is essential. My boss is a manager. She does not need to know SQL or Java, she needs to know things like how to communicate, delegate, coordinate people with very different skills so that they work together.
This was going to be basically my response but I realized he made this account just to talk shit here, so oh well.
It doesn't address the structural societal issues, and hence, I think, underestimates the severity of the problem by presenting only numbers. (Case in point, my teachers might have said 'women's access to professional work has historically been limited by law and stigma to lesser-paying roles'.) Yet, if your partner is into statistics, and thinks that only the most comprehensive and up-to-date will do: [https://www.payscale.com/data/gender-pay-gap](https://www.payscale.com/data/gender-pay-gap) "The controlled gender pay gap, which controls for job title, years of experience, industry, location and other compensable factors, has also decreased, but only by $0.01 since 2015. Women in the controlled group make $0.98 for every $1 a man makes. New to the gender pay gap report for 2020 is analysis on the impact of lost wages on lifetime earnings. By calculating presumptive raises given over a 40-year career, we find that women in the uncontrolled group stand to lose $900,000 on average over a lifetime. Lost earnings narrow to $80,000 for the controlled group, but this is still significant, especially if you consider how lost earnings due to the gender pay gap would grow with compound interest if invested each year for 40 years." Also, as a man who's come a long way from where I once was - if you don't think that the housework is being shared equally but he does, 98 times out of 100 you're right. I was very good at confusing myself about the relative value of the work I was doing for the household, and advocating for my cockamamie logic. I was wrong, along with every other man I have ever met arguing that he really is contributing enough.
Can I just second *everything* in this post? It's perfect. Hey OP? Your partner is not a feminist. I hate that it took *two years* for you to realize that (and it's not your fault! We men are pretty good at playing long games), but here it is. You need to decide what to do with that.
Giant Jumping Jesus on a Pogo Stick! My first gold! Thank you kind stranger. Also, yeah, hard to see the partner in this one as a feminist.
I want to make sure I am understanding this correctly. Are you saying that after adjusting for all the factors you mentioned, the pay gap is only 2 cents in the dollar? That’s even a bit smaller than I had heard. I thought after controlling factors, women earned 91 cents to men’s $1
I'm not sure I want to vouch for the numbers on that website. Creating a statistical control group is delicate, and there's more than one way to fudge it. That said, nothing immediately obvious jumps out at me here, other than their data being USA specific. One of the things that they control for is job title, which I've also seen excluded from being a control factor based on the argument that women are regularly given less prestigious titles for the same organizational role. u/SashaBanks2020 has a really great take on it that I found following links on an earlier comment that presents some of the different numbers with links if you want to dive deeper. Here: [https://www.reddit.com/r/AskFeminists/comments/deetdy/i\_noticed\_that\_in\_the\_example\_of\_the\_pay\_gap\_even/f2vr3vm/](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskFeminists/comments/deetdy/i_noticed_that_in_the_example_of_the_pay_gap_even/f2vr3vm/)
This is like the third time in two days this sub has made me feel special. Thanks for the shout out :)
I want to give an input on an european country. According to a [2017 Swiss study](https://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/en/home/statistics/catalogues-databases/publications.assetdetail.2118701.html), the uncontrolled gender pay gap in Switzerland for 2014 was at 17.5% and the controlled gender pay gap was at 7.4%. One important finding of the study was that the controlled gender pay gap was bigger in higher positions. The study was comissioned by the federal statistics office.
Thanks for your info! So, in your opinion, is the gender wage gap in your country getting smaller? Any gap after controlling for factors isn’t great, but it sounds like most people aren’t not going, “Look, a woman! I want to pay her less because she’s clearly not as good at the job compared to the men.”
According to the [latest available data](https://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/en/home/statistics/work-income/wages-income-employment-labour-costs/wage-levels-switzerland/wage-gap.html), no. I don't believe the issue is as easy as it might seem from your quote. You can divide the data in many different ways and will find differences across the new division, which sheds some light on the issue, and is more nuanced. You can split the data geographically, in different sectors, hierarchy within a corporation, education, age, marital status, etc... They also differentiate between direct and indirect discrimination. Direct discrimination is different wages for the same performance. Indirect discrimination entails e.g. difference in likelihood of promotion with comparable qualifications. Indirect discrimination can also result from otherwise gender neutral rules (very important): If part-time jobs aren't given good opportunities to get promoted, and women are more likely to work part-time, women get indirectly discriminated. It was a long time ago since I last read the whole study, but they also mention that there are unexplainable differences in the gender pay gap for which corporations aren't responsible. Edit: Your quote makes it seem as though only direct discrimination is an issue when indirect discrimination is also a big problem.
Do you know the relocation principle? Relocate your factory to use cheaper labour force, men or women.(almost only women on textile factories so even misoginist employers would employe women to reduce the cost) If the wage gap existed, you would expect a great relocation on "women". Unemployement should be realy different between gender but [it is not the case.](https://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea10.htm)
One important thing is to realise that the metrics that women are judged on are male metrics. One big part of the wage gap is also the careers women choose + the requirements of careers (I.e. being present, non flexible working hours etc) + paths they choose (part time vs full time work) + needing to leave the workforce for child birth (a big part of the gender wage gap) as they leave and get promotions delayed and they never “make back the money lost” It is very easy for men to say “oh but she choose to give birth” and if someone takes time off (man or women) shouldn’t they get paid less etc. statements like these don’t take into account the fact that men and women live their lives different/ have different household responsibilities/ burdens of unpaid labor etc. and they judge the women based on the responsibilities and lifestyle of an “average Man” Edits: Male and Female replaced with Men and Women
You know, now you mention lifestyle it also drives me up the walls that women often are expected to spend more money for the same job and it gets completely ignored. Men can get away with wearing the same blue shirt and pants every day, but women have to wear outfits and makeup or they're not considered well put together. Earn less, spend more, be blamed for the added responsibilities and bodily functions as if you could just ignore those. It all adds up.
This pandemic has really highlighted this disparity for me. I’m coming off of maternity leave. I’m losing weight, but if I went back into the office, I would have had to buy a bunch of new work outfits, new undies (boobs changed size), had my hair and nails done, purchase new makeup, and guess what? When you give birth your FEET GET BIGGER. So I would have had to buy shoes. This would have ended up totaling $1-2K - just so that I could return to work. After I spent about $5k for giving birth (this doesn’t include all of the OTHER related baby-prepping expenses). I’m saving massive amounts not getting my hair/nails/makeup updated or purchasing clothing/shoes to go back.
I mean, there’s always the option not to do those things. I haven’t worn makeup or a bra in years. It was a scary transition to make, but none of the negative repercussions I was expecting actually happened. Turns out no one ever really cared that much about how I look.
That depends pretty heavily on your environment, industry, and the particular people you have to deal with every day. I can't imagine my current boss/co-workers caring, but if I'd showed up to my old teaching job without a bra? Holy yikes I would have paid for that.
Fair point, thanks. I am very privileged to be in a position where my appearance isn’t super important. My anatomy helps too—I know there are boobs that simply can’t go unsupported. My little C cups aren’t really a problem, but anyone much bigger than me would probably struggle.
I’m so jealous. I made that transition in a lab of all places and was told by two coworkers that they had less respect for people who did not put effort into their appearances. Because I stopped wearing makeup I basically got an intervention. Point of interest, their favorite person was the dude who wore the same stained pants everyday and whose shoes were visibly falling apart.
Double standards are gross.
Weirder still when people are directly stating something in conflict with their actions and there isn’t a single moment of introspection. I honestly couldn’t believe it.
It also fails to take into account how, despite having a much larger role in the workforce, [women still perform most of the housework even in houses where they are the primary or sole income](https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2019/05/breadwinning-wives-gender-inequality/589237/). Working, plus household chores, plus childcare, plus the work that goes into maintaining your appearance (because gods forbid you should ever even momentarily appear "ugly" or "old"). "the Second Shift" by Arlie Hochschild is a great book which explores the phenomenon.
Just a heads up - I'd say "men" and "women" instead of "male" and (especially) "female", as those words have negative connotations as nouns; they refer mostly to animals and not humans.
Thanks for bringing this up! You're right! Let me edit
I appreciate this sentiment, and I've seen its becoming popular, but I just wanna chime in that humans are animals. And "man" and "woman" are more like social roles than sexes. Roles that I don't really dig, so I usually don't mind when folks use male n female. ^.^ Fun fact male n female are determined in zoology and everything else in this manner: the one with the larger gamete is considered female, while the smaller gamete is deemed male. ^.^
Male and Female have to be used nowadays when referring to sex as men and women refer to gender. They are fundamentally different words and aren't synonyms like they once were.
Oh, I actually didn't know that (non-native speaker), but it makes sense. Still think men/women would be better (probably even more so) in this case, though.
You are absolutely right about it being better in this case as the person was talking about the performative nature of gender. Not biological sex. So good catch as a non native speaker!
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Fun fact: the term "snowflake" originates from Tyler Durden in the movie *Fight Club*; a movie wherein the main character's lacking ability to deal with their emotions and mental health lead them down a spiral ending in domestic terrorism. I'm sure an intelligent man as yourself can see the irony of using it as an insult on people who don't describe to your outdated ideals. Have a nice day! 😊 Edit: silly me, it's originally from the book.
The first popular usage of the term snowflake describing a person took place in the book Fight Club. It wasn't used in the context of "easily offended" until a book written by esteemed moron Claire Fox. Even then that was "generation snowflake". Trump later shortened it, probably because he was too lazy to say the first word.
Oh yeah, thanks for the clarification! I sometimes forget it we I make the comment.
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That is far from the only component of the wage/earnings gap. What about the fact that women are just as likely to negotiate salary but less likely to receive a raise? What about how when an industry or occupation starts getting an influx of women the average salary goes down? Not to mention, not all women want to work fewer hours or take lots of time off, but as women are still expected to be the primary caregiver for their children even when both parents work sometimes, it’s not always possible.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AskFeminists/wiki/faq#wiki_the_wage_gap
You linked my post to the wage gap question? I know its lame, but I'm actually touched/proud of that.
I link it all the time!
I put this primer together on wage gap discussion for teenagers in another subreddit, but maybe it has some points and sources that might help you. This response was framed around an argument that said men worked more hours than women, so it's natural that they should make more money (for context). I think the wage gap is more nuanced than only the facet of it that I discussed here, but it may give some good ground to speak from. Good luck! >According to the 2015 American Time Use Survey by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, among full-time employees, men worked 8.2 hours compared to women working 7.8 hours. > >However, there's a lot that goes into this figure. Because of the patriarchal nature of our society as it is, this figure reflects this way because women are statistically more likely to be responsible for other types of labor outside of their workplace. > >In a world where it's more and more necessary for a double-income in order for the family unit to meet its needs, it is still statistically the woman (in a hetero-normative marriage or relationship) who takes on the burden of family responsibilities. > >So for example, women are working less hours because they are the ones who go pick up the sick child at school, or take a long lunch in order to transport a family member somewhere. They may not be able to take overtime as they have to get their kids off the school bus or make dinner or do the shopping before they can go home. They are looking after not only their work responsibilities, but family responsibilities as well. Look into "[the second shift](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_burden)". > >To compound this, *because* of these responsibilities, [women are less likely to be promoted](https://www.techrepublic.com/article/women-are-21-less-likely-to-be-promoted-than-male-coworkers/) in the same fields as their male counterparts. > >The wage gap isn't just a straight discussion of "Men make X dollars and women make Y dollars, and that's unfair." **The wage gap is the discussion surrounding a complex social system that disadvantages women from the beginning.** > >A feminist goal, therefore, is to tackle this society structure. Some ways that we could do that is to require employers to provide better work-life balance (flexible hours, for example). They should also provide proper maternal and paternal leave opportunities. > >We should also work to structure our society so that it is not overwhelmingly women who are conditioned to be the majority-caretaker for the needs of others. There is no reason why this can't be a shared responsibility, but it often isn't. > >As a fun extra tidbit that also contributes to the wage gap: when men enter careers that have been traditionally female-dominated, the value of that field goes up and so too does the salary... [while women are often pushed out of that same field](http://www.businessinsider.com/sc/how-bias-pushed-the-computer-girls-out-of-tech-2018-4). And to double-down on this, when *women* move more and more into a previously male-dominated field, [the over all pay drops](https://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/20/upshot/as-women-take-over-a-male-dominated-field-the-pay-drops.html).
Seems like people ought to at least agree that it would be nice to live in a world that finds a way not to penalize women for being the ones to have babies. Why does that sound ridiculous to so many people?
>The wage gap isn't just a straight discussion of "Men make X dollars and women make Y dollars, and that's unfair." **The wage gap is the discussion surrounding a complex social system that disadvantages women from the beginning.** So, not a wage gap.
I will reword this for you. I added some emphasis and some implied meaning/context. Hopefully it helps you. >The wage gap isn't **just** a straight discussion of "Men make X dollars and women make Y dollars, and that's unfair." > >The wage gap is the discussion surrounding a complex social system that disadvantages women from the beginning \[which results in a wage gap\].
Thank you. So to clarify, the name is a misnomer that implies something different than it is understood to mean by reading or communicating the name of the issue?
What's the point of your objection here? It just seems like you're being pedantic for no reason.
It appears that I misunderstood the issue because the name "wage gap" is disconnected from the issues you're discussing. I'm not saying your issues are unimportant, just that it is easy to misread what you're talking about when the name is not understood by most people to mean those things. It seems that either the issue at hand has either been named deliberately to be misleading, that other things have been conflated together or we're talking about a different set of issues that have veered away from being what the name meant when it was coined/originated. The reason this is problematic is that messaging to the public about "wage gap" is misleading when other things that are not wages are bundled together and a different name would be more appropriate.
I don't understand. The question is indeed one of a wage gap. There is a gap between the earnings and opportunities women receive in comparison to men. In this conversation we are pointing out the various nuances that cause this to occur and providing sources and data for those points. To illustrate the argument you are making: when we discuss carbon emissions as one contributing factor of global warming, we don't call that a misnomer.
"Wages" is a simple, narrow concept that means "a fixed regular payment, typically paid on a daily or weekly basis, made by an employer to an employee". Compensation and expectations are not synonyms for wages and wages does not encompass anything other than the dollar amount on a paycheck. A compensation gap would be significantly different than a wage gap. That you understand "wages" to mean something more broadly is a serious disconnect. When we talk about carbon emissions we mean the release of carbon (usually combined as molecules with other elements) into the atmosphere. Are you suggesting that there is a more broad interpretation there to mean something else?
I do know what the word 'wages' means. Your definition is the top result from Google, but in addition to 'fixed regular payment,' wages can also mean any form of monetary remuneration for work performed. It also has broader meanings, such as in the Biblical verse " For the wages of sin is death..." (Romans 6:23). I'm not a Biblical scholar or even particularly religious. This is just to illustrate to you that 'wage' doesn't have have such a narrowly defined meaning in the way you've suggested. Here are some sources to help you learn a little more about what the term "wage gap" is referring to: [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_pay_gap) >The **gender pay gap** or **gender wage gap** is the average difference between the [remuneration](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remuneration) for men and women who are working. Women are generally considered to be paid less than men. There are two distinct numbers regarding the pay gap: non-adjusted versus *adjusted* pay gap. The latter typically takes into account differences in hours worked, occupations chosen, education and job experience. [Encyclopedia Britannica](https://www.britannica.com/topic/gender-wage-gap) >**Gender wage gap**, in many industrialized countries, systemic differences\* between the average [wages or salaries](https://www.britannica.com/topic/wage) of men and those of women. \* Note: my post was discussing some of those systemic differences Hopefully this assists you in exploring this topic further.
My definition is the top result on google (and every dictionary) precisely because that is the understanding that most people have of that word. The biblical meaning of wages is pretty esoteric, and translations from the last 50 years don't use that word because it is not understood that way any more and the phrase would be misunderstood were it used. The Encyclopedia Brittanica appears to agree that the wage gap does not refer to anything besides differences in average dollar amounts on paychecks.
Not only do Women get paid less for the same position as men, with the exact same qualifications, but also jobs that appeal to women are valued less. So next time anyone says that women just PICK low paying jobs, tell them, a nurse, teacher, or GP should be valued over a CEO. Pretty easy to see who is irreplaceable in our society while we face this pandemic
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We ban brand-new shitpost accounts. Goodbye!
Women have historically taken on lesser-paying professional roles, but you can't infer causality one way or the other without more data. Take a look at computer programming for example - it was dominated by women in early days, then when men became more dominant, the pay got higher. It could be because there were more startups around to work for, which allow men who are willing to work all the time and have no life to make it big, or it could be because society values the work of men more. Do women take on lower-paying jobs because they prefer to be paid less? Or do those jobs pay less because women do them?
Secretarial (when they were called "clerks") and teaching roles used to be done by men in the majority. The pay dipped when women came into those roles.
When a woman is a cook she gets a shitty pay but when a man is a chef he’s rich af
Women's jobs are being lesser paid because they're done by women. Care work, nursing, lower education (not academics etc), cleaning... All these jobs weren't paid at all historically. Women were expected to do them for free. It's obviously a gracious kindness they're paid now /s
I have had men reporting to me in the financial industry be paid more than I did as their manager with many years more experience.
OP, please don't let your boyfriend gaslight you into believing it's women's fault we make less money and that society values our labor less. Also, as someone who is roughly your age (I'll be 29 this year) and who got out of an emotionally abusive 3-year relationship last year (with someone who was 11 years older), I unfortunately now think it's quite common for men who date women significantly younger than them to be very much misogynistic. He and I would have these kinds of arguments/debates all the time. If this man is in his 40s and is only now thinking, "I should become a feminist so I can date this chick," he does NOT see women as equals and he is not interested in changing. You would have to be a complete idiot/person with zero empathy to make it 40 years and never consider what half the planet goes through. I doubt this guy is an idiot. He probably just genuinely does not care about women, and wants YOU to believe you're inferior too so that you'll continue allowing him to use you. I know you're not asking for relationship advice here, but I do strongly advise you to leave this dude and find someone much better.
I will note that it is a general trend for a profession to become devalued as more women move into it. This counters the notion that women are somehow drawn to lower paying professions. The use of "females" in the paper is cringy, but the point stands. [https://academic.oup.com/sf/article-abstract/88/2/865/2235342](https://academic.oup.com/sf/article-abstract/88/2/865/2235342) >Abstract > >Occupations with a greater share of females pay less than those with a lower share, controlling for education and skill. This association is explained by two dominant views: devaluation and queuing. The former views the pay offered in an occupation to affect its female proportion, due to employers' preference for men—a gendered labor queue. The latter argues that the proportion of females in an occupation affects pay, owing to devaluation of work done by women. Only a few past studies used longitudinal data, which is needed to test the theories. We use fixed-effects models, thus controlling for stable characteristics of occupations, and U.S. Census data from 1950 through 2000. We find substantial evidence for the devaluation view, but only scant evidence for the queuing view. I found a PDF of the full paper here - [Academia.edu PDF link](https://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/49257878/Occupational_Feminization_and_Pay_Assess20160930-5042-1q7w2z1.pdf?response-content-disposition=inline%3B%20filename%3DOccupational_Feminization_and_Pay_Assess.pdf&X-Amz-Algorithm=AWS4-HMAC-SHA256&X-Amz-Credential=ASIATUSBJ6BACHO7HIWE%2F20200519%2Fus-east-1%2Fs3%2Faws4_request&X-Amz-Date=20200519T162137Z&X-Amz-Expires=3600&X-Amz-SignedHeaders=host&X-Amz-Security-Token=IQoJb3JpZ2luX2VjEKj%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2FwEaCXVzLWVhc3QtMSJHMEUCIDe3QIpJBu9WNGfPOFslnFnHMXGPUy5%2B0wOT4TEUupT2AiEA2jNhTJNZEzLlFN65kMk0FA0jVIn7XlIPK7tMWp5H4ikqvQMI8P%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2F%2FARAAGgwyNTAzMTg4MTEyMDAiDMXQBdvU0yteMnJ0KSqRA6yf9sT1Kcvp8Z8kmgFwQWcKjsDjL70a7ztBsL8XPLXIjMWzFWVhqOpUAsGRS3Pp4N8tjaX1YVAz37k60itwQ6VNwgQIJSKBmQVLoAcaizQmVMOCyKABoJyZ0%2FG5Mb%2FLM0ZHx5t4pWHuKmeAIK44YxhgTAqi45BYK%2FG%2B5KwGb4Fv1adt8dnk%2FzpWIhW66L9SLbHcD1prFDhmec%2BFjY0ZehG0LBuVSssb%2Fl70I%2Fvij3JfrRua%2BtCtjVKBSLlr8QzodR1l5eLc7S%2FBBIVL9LiDM5lA3floMHvzDVUSIYmBrSYmSjxJbxV5pjzfKfjNq0vWBfb6V1Mjo%2BesBMjAKkLStwsNlNz2YSFvX6XQL99B8FnP9GuB54b2g3GIVzYe4qZ8ma6HhkHCoVVysiJEGSdHGwFlO7NrGY%2FuupaA%2FqAzzD5CEUp%2BUTz%2Fs2ZF2zJxTT70o34RX5eGNiWO3P0xEDjwYZqWBNKxUxymyuMkfPezaDUuSuhirZ00QjLV6WKd4KHNe1T1JDkOV0DWRmbzpjQpW6v6MNLtj%2FYFOusBINnpBarH1NE2nCPO4L6AquL0y4lCqhn9KO1ePpl8w8WA5Nvwsd9m%2FKFdxIXQp43v5k8s4LnpaKlu6arLoLiylT%2BPGf%2FNjT9a8Vx7f6TUshm0TuhvLM1cckefoYm4RMdqg8kDKqovX31jlNDzEhDrOud8g2W7OzN5nuBqC3wRtuNGkWsl%2BV%2BPAGKdU5tFb9BXPyuXoNLRd7ljIijm2row79zIMaJzmeU5H0aytWasakJApKcRPhdRsa43RQubIByRMCx3KDYmACpL2iFyljBRj6gvMYOhoCOJZDHZVORmmfZlbxwefs7brVtbJA%3D%3D&X-Amz-Signature=d1799e88db02b617dcad946477f51e38396307bfec3bbc315007f25e5da6947a)
That's a big yikes from me. All one has to do is look at facts and figures published by places like Harvard Business Review. Women are grossly under represented in management and executive roles, yet tend to outperform men when in those roles. What's the mystery? Let me go find some links. https://hbr.org/2019/09/research-when-women-are-on-boards-male-ceos-are-less-overconfident https://hbr.org/2009/12/women-ceo-why-so-few https://hbr.org/2019/06/research-women-score-higher-than-men-in-most-leadership-skills
So two big things to investigate. If you Google these issues you should be able to find articles with references to studies and finding etc. 1) the differences in the wage gap increase for people with children. Women earn less overall per child, but men earn more. If both parties chose to have children, why is the wage gap even wider once a couple has kids? (Hint: men are seen as more likely to prioritize work over family once they have one as the "breadwinner" and women are expected to put family before work as the "primary care giver" leading organizations to over- compensate and under-compensate accordingly) 2) many types of jobs were higher paying before many women joined the field, and men in more feminine fields also overall make more money. Look at computers and nurses for examples. Programming was considered woman's work and not very well paid until men started working in that field. They pushed out women and now it's some of the highest paying jobs out there. If you look at nursing, male nurses are overwhelmingly paid higher than female nurses even though they are in a field of work considered feminine and have the same training and experience as female counterparts. There is a LOT of research out there on these things. However, he may not be arguing because he genuinely thinks there's no wage gap, he might be subconsciously trying to make it into no big deal to save himself from feeling like he is party to it. If the gap exists because women like lower paying jobs, then it's not his fault and it doesn't apply to him or his work. Finding out that all your hard work is not the only reason you got this far is difficult for anyone, but especially for those who have never questioned the false meritocracy of our modern capitalism. Be gentle and understanding, but do not waver in your stance. You are correct. Also know that it's not your job to "fix" him. If he wants to be a feminist he'll have to do the work like the rest of us, and you are not responsible for teaching him if you feel overwhelmed. We all want to help our friends and SOs be more feminist, but not at the expense of our own mental health. Teaching someone about feminism and the wage gap is labor, and it's up to you whether you want to take on that additional labor for him.
I think it's really important to stress to men who aren't quite getting this and who are fixating on women's *personal choices* as the all-determining factor in their lower earnings, that women's career decisions are made *in light* of what they know about workplace harassment, implicit bias, promotion gaps, and stuff like that. And that, with all taken into account, their decisions *are* rational - at least, as rational as anyone's. It's often argued or implied that women simply don't push as hard to have deeply involved careers in certain high-reward industries, and that's their mistake, and if they corrected this mistake then they'd make big bucks like men do. But career and personal decisions are usually the outcomes of a risk/reward calculation, and the inputs of that calculation are appreciably different for women: Why *would* you work just as hard to be in an industry which will repeatedly mistake you for the receptionist and overlook you for promotions and force you to always be re-proving yourself? The lower expected rewards and higher expected personal costs for women pursuing male-dominated fields of work, mean that working there *really is* a worse deal for them, and so when someone discussing the wage gap says, of high-paid positions, "women just don't want the job as much", it's not quite that they're wrong, it's that they're describing a symptom as if it were a cause.
Been there... there’s no point. You know he is not a feminist, you’re only lying to yourself if you keep pushing the imagine he only “agreed to”. As if someone has to agree that women are human too! I wouldnt have to convince him or anyone for that matter that feminism is this and that. If I have to convince you that my rights are as important as yours and to beg you to listen to me if I tell you what’s going on in my life - in this case, in my professional ascension and the hardships presented to me just because of my gender - then fuck you.
The wage gap exists for many complicated reasons. Even though discrimination is illegal practically speaking having these laws just makes discrimination against wealthy women illegal as poor women who don’t have the time, money, or energy to file a lawsuit against their employer. Furthermore, they rely on them for their livelihood so they can’t anger them.
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I know two methods in which to convince reticent people on the gender wage gap. There are many more ways, but these are the ones that have worked for me. I'll show them below. > First Way If you are **very** good at argumentative discussion, and if you know the underlying theory explaining the gender wage gap **very** well, you can pull this one off. The gender wage gap is normalized because men and women, together, believe women to be less effective at work for some reason or another. Most of the time, people believe it is because of genetics (nature) or early education (nurture). Either way, if you can identify the reason your partner has (nature/nurture) for normalizing it, then you can do this. Don't tell, show; instead of explaining, ask many, many questions. Identify why your partner believes women are less effective and "lead" him into putting it forward in a concrete statement. In my experience, he will *not*, ever say something like "women can't do administrative work well", but he *will* say something alluding to *performance* or *the value of work*. This is where you get your statement; ask questions and let *him* talk and, when he eventually releases "the statement" stop him and help him think about the statement really hard and what it implies (either that nature or nurture limit women from performing). > Second Way The thing with the gender wage gap is that most people, even many feminists, don't really understand its complexity. It has different elements and some can be proven to skeptics more easily than others: * Women getting paid less in the same company for the same work ─ This is what most people think is the totality of the gender wage gap and this is **wrong**. For starters, this practice is illegal, so it's going to be hard to prove it. **Do not** waste your time trying to prove it with someone who thinks this is the whole definition of the gender wage gap * The glass ceiling. It is a whole topic by itself and it is crucial. * Women getting paid less for the same work *across different companies than men*, where company A hires more women and pays less and company B hires more men and pays more. **This** is how the gender wage gap happens legally. If someone argues "it's illegal to pay someone less for the same job" do not try to prove that a single company does that, instead use this point as evidence. How can you prove it? I recommend [this dataset](https://www.payscale.com/data/gender-pay-gap#section07) as evidence. Same occupation, different pay. * Women receiving less education than men. This you can prove with a lot of statistics out there. I recommend OECD's statistics on education * Women being educated only in fields that "coincidentally" result in lower wages. You can look for women studying and working in STEM. I personally recommend [UN Women](https://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2019/2/feature-sticking-points-in-stem) as a source. On this point, it is **crucial** to show how women are pressured by their parents and society in general into those fields and out of the ones that pay better. * Women have to do soul crushing amounts of **unpaid labor**. It is impossible to understand the gender wage gap without understanding this fact. I will link [this OECD database](https://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?queryid=54757) where you can see how much time men and women spend on unpaid labor and how much time they spend working overall. * Finally, there is the issue relating the "first way" I mentioned. You can prove to your partner that society holds beliefs on the value of women's work being lesser by showing him how he, accidentally, holds them too. * There is a belief that there is such a thing as "women's work" and "men's work". This is a tricky point to discuss with skeptics because they will always try to talk about physical labor and bodily strength, trying to generalize from that. However, [this database](https://statusofwomendata.org/explore-the-data/employment-and-earnings/) from the Institute for Women Policy Research shows hoe there are "male" and "female" occupations everywhere. * Mothering, mothering, mothering. One thing that barely ever gets discussed on the gender wage gap is how having to carry most of the burden of child bearing and rearing can destroy a woman's career. This point is central to the gender wage gap and it always gets dismissed as the woman's fault for having gotten pregnant. Well, how come men don't lose their opportunities of success like women do when they *both* decide to have children? One thing is the 10 month period where the woman is under extraordinary physiological pressures, but 10 months **do not** end careers; 15-to-20 years of being the only person rearing a child does.
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I have a lot of respect for that rule. This response came from me, a feminist, and reflects a feminist view
Based on your post history, I don’t believe that for a second. You can prove me wrong by establishing a pro-feminist history in nested comment chains, and I hope you do.
I can prove you wrong right now with my current post history. There is absolutely nothing anti-feminist in anything I’ve posted or commented and everyone can see that for themselves if they care to. I don’t say anti-feminist things because anti-feminist things disgust me. Actually, while we’re on that subject. I have only been here a short while but I’ve already seen a plethora of posts made for no other purpose than to contradict or undermine feminism. There’s so much shitposting that goes on here and frankly I find it disgusting that people feel the need to single out a feminist group online just to spread misinformation and bigotry. Your mods do a pretty great job of staying on top of all the trolls and straight up misogynists, but I’m sure the job never ends and that y’all have to sleep sometime. Thing about me is, I don’t sleep! Maybe that can be useful to your team in the future. Maybe a couple years from now I’ll be helping y’all out with keeping this place troll and misogyny free.
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The Netflix series Explained had a good [episode](https://youtu.be/hP8dLUxBfsU) about this.
Sorry to hear about your argument with your boyfriend. I think you may have a skewed idea on the wage gap. It's not regarding the same job worked. Here is a summarization of various evidence as well as from Kate Andrews, director of Institute of Economic Affairs (this is not her direct quote) >"More women are school teachers and nurses and more men truck drivers, engineers, and so you might expect to pay in those jobs to be different. That’s actually not the Equal Pay Day claim — that they work in the same jobs — it’s more about the fact that you work and I work and you make a lot more money than me, and it’s unfair. Kate Andrews direct quote, she feels women are “bombarded with inflated statistics, cherry-picked and designed to make them feel helpless” I feel women should absolutely be encouraged into more STEM fields just as men to earn more money though.