Gender_Workplace_Discrimination

Gender Wage Gap Discrimination in Workplace It has been 35 years since the Equal Pay Act of 1963 and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 were signed into law in an attempt to eliminate wage discrimination based on gender. As a testament to the fact that the issue is not yet resolved is the fact that the first major piece of legislation signed by President Obama was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, another attempt to bring equity to the issue. In this case, the question was not whether gender wage discrimination was, in fact in action, but whether the restrictive requirements of Title VII as far as discovery and filing dates had been satisfied. The court in their majority opinion concurred that discrimination had, in fact been practiced. All the articles I read generally agree that there is a differential between the median wage of men and women, although the size of the difference and the trend of the difference are of some contention. The central question is not whether a difference exists, but whether the existence of the difference indicates that wage discrimination is still prevalent. In her article for Women’s Media in April of 2009 , Evelyn Murphy, former Lt. Governor of Massachusetts and a Resident Scholar at Brandeis University, claims that “Women working full time – not part time, not on maternity leave, not as consultants – still only earn 77 cents for every full time male dollar. The wage gap has been stalled for more than a decade” (Murphy, April 2009). Presenting a contrasting view in her article for Money Magazine, Cristen Conger states “According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the median wage for female full time workers in the United States was 80 percent of the male median wage in 2007” (Conger, February 2009). She goes on to note the trend: “On the upside for female workers, that gap has narrowed considerably since the BLS began comparing gender wage data in 1979, then women made merely 62 percent of a man’s media salary” (Conger, February 2009). As even in disagreement as to the size and trend, there is agreement in the existence of the gap. One possible cause of the wage difference has been labeled as the ‘family gap’. In his 2000 article for the Regional Economist, Dr Howard J. Wall, Director of the Center for Regional Economics (CRE8) noted that “Some of this unexplained portion [of the difference in median incomes between genders] might be due to the difficulties involved in accounting for the effects of childbearing on women’s wages. For example, women aged 27 to 33 who have never had children earn a median income that is 98 percent of a man’s” (Wall, October 2009). The focus here is on the absence of a means to measure the effect of career interruption due to parenting and childbirth. This lack of a measure also means that the contribution of this factor to the difference in median wages cannot be effectively gauged. So far it does not appear that there is any definitive progress on the career interruption factor. Echoing this effect of the ‘family gap’ a study by Burda, Hamermesh and Weil finds that “women log more hours at home and men perform more work for pay” (M. Burda, P. Weil, D. Hamermesh, January 2009). This difference in punch lock hours worked, as opposed to domestic hours worked, has a significant effect on the median wage of women. A study conducted by Budig and England estimated that “American women experience a 7 percent wage penalty per child” due to factors associated with these additional domestic responsibilities (M. Budig, P. England, January 2009). A similar study by Ameu-Dorantes conducted on “college educated women who waited to have children after 30 found no such wage gap,” reflecting the conclusions of Dr. Wall (C. Ameu-Dorantes, J. Kimmel, 2005). The costs on the individuals and society of postponing childbirth, and the resultant lower fertility rates and higher birth risks have yet to be totaled. The Pregnancy Discrimination Act of 1978 was one attempt to decrease the economic impacts of parenting on women, still other legislation and changes in tax laws have improved the availability of time for parenting and care giving while minimizing the immediate economic impacts. Dr. Wall summarizes his view in his 2000 article concluding “Even in a world free of all types of gender discrimination, as long as people choose to have children, there will likely be a gap between the average earnings of men and women” (Wall, October 2000). So, in this fact, Dr. Wall is stating that discrimination is not an assumable factor when concluding about the infant rate compared to the wage gap; because that is just a portion of the role that women fulfill as part of our society and continuation of the species. It would be an echo of George Orwell’s 1984 novel to expect that women would no longer be the child-rearing portion of our society, or even to force them to make the trade off between motherhood and career as we presently do. Career selection is also listed in most major studies as a large contributor to the difference in the median wage differential. Conger notes in her Money article that “In other words, fields that attract the most women tend to pay less. Education and healthcare industries attract about a third of female employees; the median weekly income of those sectors is $841 and $920 respectively. Roughly the same proportion of men works in computer and engineering fields, where the median salary tops $1,120” (Conger, February 2009). Conger goes on to note that when ordering occupations by income that “Only in the bottom 25 percent of incomes do women outnumber men” (Conger, February 2009). Alyson Reed, Director of the National Committee on Pay Equity, in reflecting on the career paths most often chosen by women notes “Career preparation and training are also affected by gender norms. Women are encouraged to pursue certain types of work and discouraged from pursuing others. These gender role expectations can be very subtle, such as when media stereotypes what is considered appropriate behavior for women or they can be profound such as when women enter traditionally male dominated fields and encounter hostile work environments” (H. Wall, A. Reed, April 2001). The low pay of teachers has long been a topic of discussion in the media, both from a personal perspective and the effect on the quality of education. There have also been a number of informal studies in such as that from ‘Salary.com’ on what a spouse would/should be paid based on all the domestic activities and responsibilities, and all results published trumpet that the domestic spouse is pitifully under compensated, with stay at home moms “would earn $134,121annually (up from 2005’s salary of $131,471) Working Moms would earn $85,876 annually for the ‘mom job’ portion of their work in addition to their actual ‘work job’ salary” (J. Jost, May 2006). After surveying the various contributors to the gender wage gap, Dr Wall notes in a spirited debate with Alyson Reed that: “Alyson and I seem to agree that wage discrimination explains little of the gender wage gap” (H. Wall, A. Reed, April 2001) . Conger seems to reach a similar conclusion when she notes: “An explanation for the gender gap doesn’t just boil down to rampant sexism. It is a far more nuanced combination of economic, social and educational factors.” (Conger, February 2009). I particularly like her use of the phrase ‘nuanced combination’ as that seems particularly appropriate to describe the societal preferences and pressures that produce indirect results such as the wage gap. Dr Wall goes on to conclude in his original 2000 article: “Most of the gender wage gap is due to factors other than wage discrimination, so it is illusory as an indicator of wage discrimination” (Wall, October 2000). Note that Dr Wall does not say that wage discrimination does not exist, just that the wage gap, as currently constructed and published, is not a good indicator of the level of wage discrimination in the workplace. In studying wage discrimination, much like racial discrimination, the devil is in the details, and the details are the statistics of individual cases. Indeed, Evelyn Murphy urges readers to “Go to www.wageproject.org and look at the sex discrimination case file. You’ll see how often employers would rather pay a one time fine rather than actually make changes in their organizations that would be fair to women” (E. Murphy, E.J. Graff, April 2009). A review of the web site shows a very active agenda of ongoing litigation, some as old as 1980, some inititiated this year. As long as organizations like Evelyn Murphy’s ‘WAGE Club’ and ‘OWL’ are prosecuting cases, to which Congress concludes that a legislative remedy, such as the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, is necessary, you can rest assured that gender wage discrimination is present in the workplace and it is an issue still needs our sensitivity to it’s presence and our refusal to it’s acceptance. References 1. Conger, Cristen. "Is there a gender gap in the workplace'." 17 February 2009. HowStuffWorks.com. 05 December 2009. 2. Evelyn Murphy with E.J. Graff, "Gender Wage Gap: Are you paid as much as a man if he had your job'" Women’s Media http://www.womensm edia.com/money/95-gender-wage-gap-are-you-paid-as-much-as-a-man-if-he-had-your-job.html 3. “Mean Earnings of Workers 18 Years and Over, by Educational Attainment, Race, Hispanic Origin, and Sex: 1975 to 2006” U.S Census Bureau (Jan 29, 2009) 4. Howard J. Wall, "The Gender Wage Gap and Wage Discrimination: Illusion or Reality." The Regional Economist, October 2000 http://www.stlouisfed.org/publications/re/articles/'id=480 5. Burda, Michael; Hamermesh, Daniel S; and Weil, Phillip. “Total Workm Gender and Social Norms.” National Bureau of Economic Research March 2007. (Jan 29, 2009) http://www.nber.org/papers/w13000 6. Budig, Michelle J and England, Paula. “The Wage Penalty for Motherhood”, American Sociological Review. Vol 66, 2001. (Jan 29, 2009) http://www.asanet.org/galleries/default-file/motherwage.pdf 7. Ameu-Dorantes, Catalina and Kimmel, Jean. “The Motherhood Wage Gap for Women in the United States.” Review of Economics of the Houshold. Vol 3. 2005 8. Howard J.Wall and Alyson Reed, "How Much of the Gender Wage Gap is Due to Discrimination" The Regional Economist, April 2001. http://www.stlouisfed.org/publications/re/articles/'id=466 9. "What is a Mom Worth' Working Mom vs. Stay at Home Mom Salaries for 2006" http://www.salary.com/aboutus/layoutscripts/abtl_default.asp'tab=12&ser=ser041&part=Par499 10. Older Women's League http://www.owl-national.org/Welcome.html 11. Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., 550 U.S. 618 (2007), 12. Long, Cindy. “Public Supports Higher Pay for Teachers” http://www.nea.org/home/35916.htm