Why are women paid less than men, if they are? (reasons and solutions)

[Smart_Guy]

Hello guys.

I heard women are paid less that men. Is this true, and to what extent and level if it is? I'm not sure myself since where I live the society forces, encourages and expect men to be the source of income to the family.

Point of debate and discussion:
Any reasons and solution you have in mind for this?

My view just for you to know (I'm not debating it to prove it, I admit it could be wrong):
I suck socially, so all I can tell is that if a man and a woman do the same absolute everything and have the same qualifications (salaries here make use of previous experience certificates), they should be paid equally. But I honestly think women should get more allowances and breaks for pregnancy and all of its related stuff. The only reason I say this is because I want it for my sisters and mother if they work (and my mother did work as a kindergarten principal before).

What's your input in this?

 

[Sunstone]

Paying women the same as men would add billions of dollars to the US economy. It would be good for everyone.

 

[Smart_Guy]

Agreed. I personally know women of high caliber that equals that of 100 men. They must be taken care of as they deserve and even more as encouragement.

 

[Quetzal]

Any reasons and solution you have in mind for this?

Because it is easy to get away with. The pay is supposedly confidential so even if I woman protested her pay against an equally talented male worker, the powers at be can easily justify it on the spot. "Oh, well he knows how to do x, while you don't." Further, women tend to be less confrontational in a patriarchal society so there is little concern for backlash simply because she doesn't have a dog in the fight. It is getting better, but it hasn't gone away.

 

[YmirGF]

Paying women the same as men would add billions of dollars to the US economy. It would be good for everyone.

But are there really any companies in the US that would DARE to pay a woman less than they would pay a man for the same job? I would imagine that would put them squarely (and rightly) in the middle of a discrimination suit.

 

[Quetzal]

But are there really any companies in the US that would DARE to pay a woman less than they would pay a man for the same job? I would imagine that would put them squarely (and rightly) in the middle of a discrimination suit.

They can and they do.

 

[Sunstone]

"In 2013, the median woman working full-time all year earned 78 percent of what the median man working full-time all year earned. Phrased differently, she earned 78 cents for every dollar he did. Although this gap generally narrowed between the 1970s and 1990s, it has largely stopped narrowing and has remained between 76 and 78 cents since 2001."

...snip...

"Even when women and men are working side-by-side performing similar tasks, however, the pay gap does not fully disappear. Blau and Kahn decomposed the pay gap and concluded that differences in occupation and industry explain about 49 percent of the wage gap, but 41 percent of the wage gap is not explained by differences in educational attainment, experience, demographic characteristics, job type,or union status using the Panel Survey of Income Dynamics. Using a similar approach, but newer data from the Current Population Survey, the Council of Economic Advisers finds that industry and occupation can explain about 20 percent of the wage gap, but about two-thirds of the gap is not explained by potential experience, age, race,education, industry, or occupation."

[Source]

Obviously, something is afoot.

 

[Revoltingest]

They can and they do.

How do you know this?
I'm not saying you're wrong, but the wage gap is explainable by other factors.
And as someone noted, to pay'm less for the same job would get'm in legal hot water.

 

[columbus]

They can and they do.

I don't believe that is true.
I believe that the main difference in pay is that women choose careers and jobs based on factors other than pay more often than men.
Tom

 

[lovesong]

They aren't. This whole wage gap thing is just misconstrued statistics. Yes it is true that on average a woman makes 70 (71, 77, 78? It keeps changing) cents for ever dollar a man makes. ON AVERAGE. This does not mean for the same work, this means overall. Overall a woman makes 70% of what a man does. This makes perfect sense when you realize that not only do women take time off for maternity leave, become stay at home parents and whatnot more than men but also that women seem to be taking lesser-paying jobs than men. The highest paying fields like engineering and medicine are male-dominated while there seem to be a lot more women in things like the arts and education. This does not mean women are paid less than men for the same work at all. It is quite illegal to pay two employees in equal positions different salaries for characteristics like race or sex. Like, HIGHLY ILLEGAL. Companies would be in some really deep sh*t if they were doing this, but luckily they're not. Sure you could make some argument that none of this really maters since women are subjected to these lower-paying jobs by societal pressure and that they're beaten down by the mean ol' patriarchy blah blah blah, but in reality no woman is getting paid less for doing the exact same work as a man, it just doesn't work that way.

 

[Quetzal]

How do you know this?
I'm not saying you're wrong, but the wage gap is explainable by other factors.
And as someone noted, to pay'm less for the same job would get'm in legal hot water.

I don't believe that is true.
I believe that the main difference in pay is that women choose careers and jobs based on factors other than pay more often than men.
Tom

It would be very difficult to prove in either case, I will give you that. As mentioned above, it is easy to explain/circumvent away. You can use a wide myriad of fabricated reasons that would be acceptable. "Oh no, we pay fairly, but Cindy has been here three days less than bob, that is why her pay is 10% less over the last five years!" or "Her personal evaluation was less than her male counterparts, which has nothing to do with her being a woman, which is why we pay her less." See what I mean? How could you make it stick? You couldn't. The problem is there may be foul play and there is really nothing that can be done about it.

 

[YmirGF]

If companies can hire women for less money why do any men have jobs? If I can shrink my payroll with an all female workforce why one earth would I hire some silly males?

 

[Quetzal]

They aren't. This whole wage gap thing is just misconstrued statistics. Yes it is true that on average a woman makes 70 (71, 77, 78? It keeps changing) cents for ever dollar a man makes. ON AVERAGE. This does not mean for the same work, this means overall. Overall a woman makes 70% of what a man does. This makes perfect sense when you realize that not only do women take time off for maternity leave, become stay at home parents and whatnot more than men but also that women seem to be taking lesser-paying jobs than men. The highest paying fields like engineering and medicine are male-dominated while there seem to be a lot more women in things like the arts and education. This does not mean women are paid less than men for the same work at all. It is quite illegal to pay two employees in equal positions different salaries for characteristics like race or sex. Like, HIGHLY ILLEGAL. Companies would be in some really deep sh*t if they were doing this, but luckily they're not. Sure you could make some argument that none of this really maters since women are subjected to these lower-paying jobs by societal pressure and that they're beaten down by the mean ol' patriarchy blah blah blah, but in reality no woman is getting paid less for doing the exact same work as a man, it just doesn't work that way.

I'm a data driven guy, show me the data in the other direction and I would be more apt to agree.

 

[Sunstone]

They aren't. This whole wage gap thing is just misconstrued statistics. Yes it is true that on average a woman makes 70 (71, 77, 78? It keeps changing) cents for ever dollar a man makes. ON AVERAGE. This does not mean for the same work, this means overall. Overall a woman makes 70% of what a man does. This makes perfect sense when you realize that not only do women take time off for maternity leave, become stay at home parents and whatnot more than men but also that women seem to be taking lesser-paying jobs than men. The highest paying fields like engineering and medicine are male-dominated while there seem to be a lot more women in things like the arts and education. This does not mean women are paid less than men for the same work at all. It is quite illegal to pay two employees in equal positions different salaries for characteristics like race or sex. Like, HIGHLY ILLEGAL. Companies would be in some really deep sh*t if they were doing this, but luckily they're not. Sure you could make some argument that none of this really maters since women are subjected to these lower-paying jobs by societal pressure and that they're beaten down by the mean ol' patriarchy blah blah blah, but in reality no woman is getting paid less for doing the exact same work as a man, it just doesn't work that way.

See post #7, second paragraph. Then read the source. Your argument is refuted in detail in the source. You're welcome.

 

[Sunstone]

I don't believe that is true.
I believe that the main difference in pay is that women choose careers and jobs based on factors other than pay more often than men.
Tom

See post #7, second paragraph. Then read the source. Your argument is refuted in detail in the source. You're welcome.

 

[Revoltingest]

It would be very difficult to prove in either case, I will give you that. As mentioned above, it is easy to explain/circumvent away. You can use a wide myriad of fabricated reasons that would be acceptable. "Oh no, we pay fairly, but Cindy has been here three days less than bob, that is why her pay is 10% less over the last five years!" or "Her personal evaluation was less than her male counterparts, which has nothing to do with her being a woman, which is why we pay her less." See what I mean? How could you make it stick? You couldn't. The problem is there may be foul play and there is really nothing that can be done about it.

This is just speculation though.
I know a great many men & women who work for various companies.
None see the disparity you claim.
This of course proves nothing.
But it makes me skeptical that this particular problem exists on a large scale without my seeing it & also being legally dangerous for the company.
Other factors....
- Women don't work the same distribution of jobs as men.
- Women tend to take more time away from careers than men.

When I had a whole heard of employees, men generally made more.
Why?
Maintenance workers were in great demand, but few women chose that line of work.
Office workers were in less demand, & they tended to be women.
But I'd pay above market wages to keep a good office worker.
(People tend to underestimate the cost of turnover, & the value of a smoothly running office.)

 

[Revoltingest]

If companies can hire women for less money why do any men have jobs? If I can shrink my payroll with an all female workforce why one earth would I hire some silly males?

I know!
I found an even cheaper labor source than women.......fat women.
They're so discriminated against that I could get a better worker for a given wage by hiring them.
My company even had a reputation for fat ones.
I didn't care.
It was about the money & the work.

 

[columbus]

Several years ago I was on the board of my church. I was also on the "ministerial search" committee because our minister retired.

I advocated strongly for hiring a female. Everyone was all about that. Until I explained that I knew that the pay disparity index was about .75-1 in the field and I assumed we would get a better candidate for the money if they had boobs.

Suddenly nobody liked that idea any more.
What's wrong with being practical about these things?
Tom

 

[Revoltingest]

Several years ago I was on the board of my church. I was also on the "ministerial search" committee because our minister retired.

I advocated strongly for hiring a female. Everyone was all about that. Until I explained that I knew that the pay disparity index was about .75-1 in the field and I assumed we would get a better candidate for the money if they had boobs.

Suddenly nobody liked that idea any more.
What's wrong with being practical about these things?
Tom

Your enlightened self interest is good because it steers the market in the direction of women being in more demand, which means more money for them.
My approach differed slightly though....I never required women (or men) to have boobs.

 

[lovesong]

The Washington Examiner, The Huffington Post, The National Review, and Forbes all feature articles (with studies) that disprove the wage gap. I'm truly not trying to cop out but it is midterm week. If this thread is still going in a few days I'll read more into all the listed studies.