So another study came out yesterday on pay gaps between men and women. This one, unlike many others, look at salaries in the first year and then ensuing decade after college – which to a given degree eliminates to some degree the differences in pay assumed to be the product of pregnancy and workforce leaves. The study also looks at women and men who made the same choices in terms of careers (eliminating arguments about women choosing lower paying careers (and a separate screed from me about how teachers are underpaid because we devalue anything viewed as women’s work) and lifestyle (number of hours worked, family commitments). The new was grim.
And what did most women I know do? Sigh angrily, because honestly, did you expect us to be surprised that women earn 76% of what men do in math and, in fact, some differential less in every field? That the study also looks at GPAs (women’s were higher than men’s on average, and the pay differential still existed) and again, no surprise to ay of us who have been in the work force.
And the question becomes why? Why is it like this and what can we do?
First women do need to be better negotiators and greater risk takers. We have to be prepared to walk away from situations in which were are not fairly valued – both in our personal lives and our professional ones. This is hard for women; this is often hard for me – but approval and a reputation for being nice and accommodating doesn’t by groceries.
That said, I think it’s utterly unfair to place the pay differential stats at the door of women, as there’s a whole lot of basic human behavior stuff that goes on here. For example, studies also show that taller people and more attractive people in the same industry on average receive higher salaries. Women are shorter than men as a rule, and the standards of attractiveness for women are much more stringent than for men. Additionally, for all the lip-service we pay to equality, I’m not sure human beings are wired for it – we’re hierarchical, and like the rest of the animal kingdom, respond to visual displays of that hierarchy – who can kill the most food for dinner? who can protect the cave? who has the best plumage? etc. etc. etc. We see it in children, the most picked on child in class knowing that their life will get better if they can just find or place someone below them on the food chain – no matter how wrong they know or want it to be. The fact is that on a collective basis, bias is back in our lizard brains instinctually comfortable.
So does that mean there’s no hope? No, it doesn’t. But change takes a lot longer than a few decades or even half a century and requires broad changes both inside and outside the workplace. Women need to get over the idea that the ability to be anything means the necessity to be everything (men certainly aren’t). Everyone also needs to stop looking at gender in terms of resources – as many more women enter college and do well in college, men become the scarce and seemingly desirable commodity in the work place. The commodification of individuals is scary; it’s double scary when it focuses on external factors -- gender, height, race, etc.-- as (erroneously) analogous to internal ones of skill, drive and utility.
One of the many reasons I’ve opted out of the corporate world is because it’s far more important to me to be good than pleasing. Another is that I prefer living life on my own terms, and the corporate world isn’t too keen on that – in men or women.
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Comments: 17
Another thing that I have noticed is that when women are assertive they are labeled as pushy, hard, etc. Never mind the fact that they aren't any more assertive then their male counterparts, it is still looked at as a bad thing in women, yet an accepted thing in men.
Bad male boss = individual idiosyncrasy. Bad female boss = all females are bad bosses. This paints a really negative picture of how men generally regard woman in positions of authority no matter how good they might be.
There is a book that includes a great discussion of this entire phenomenon. It's called The Measure of a Woman. I'm not sure it's even still in print. The basic premise is that women will always lose out when the standard against which they are measured is that of males. We cannot be better men than can men. However, that's not what we should be measured against, but rather by the results we get. Women have their own set of strengths and weaknesses. Measure a man using that measure and he comes out wanting. The biggest mistake women ever made in the business world was when feminists decided they had to out-male the men.
So I don't see where we can win on this one. Contempt for women in general seems wired into children from the time they are small. Men still tell their sons to stop acting like girls if they cry.
I would also like to see all girls physically capable of doing so begin studying karate or its equivalent starting at the age of eight. One of the major reasons that men bully women is because we can. (The psychological reasons: feelings of inferiority, etc. are there, too, but we cannot provide psychoanalysis for everybody with a Y chromosome.) If you were to show us that we are liable to get a broken jaw for our bullying, we would be less likely to do it. The politest societies are those -- like feudal Japan, 17th century France, and the American West ("Deadwood" notwithstanding) -- where rudeness must be backed up with a steady swordhand or a quick gun, or face extinction.
People in positions of power like that power and don't want to give up the privileges that come with it. We have to keep chipping away at it. All these little situations where we insist on respect and our rights add up. Nobody changes if they don't have to. I grew up in the fifties and sixties and I can see gradual change for women coming about. For instance, my parents felt that education for their daughters came secondarily to education for their son. The reason: obviously we were going to get married and our husbands would support us, as had been their way. Guess what? We worked and lived at home for jr. college and got educated anyway, then got married and raised families while still working and being discriminated against. But we were working. (Well, women have ALWAYS worked). Brother got his way paved. So our generation woke up to that mistake and told their daughters they could be anything. Now, guess what? The men are still holding most of the positions of power, and you wonderful strong young women don't like it (well, we didn't either). But now with the internet it's easier to organize and fight back. Young moms and working women may not have time to go out and picket, but they can get on their computers and demand changes from their lawmakers both directly and via organizations. This is our mental karate!!
I was a stellar safety engineer - so why was I so underpaid? Because I was female? In my case, I don't think so. I think it was politics; i.e. I wouldn't shut up when I was supposed to because I worked SAFETY. I don't like corpses on my conscience. But, also, I acknowledged that my choices were part of that. Could I have sold my integrity and brought home the bacon? You bet. I saw the opportunities and refused to take them. Did I choose to work 40 hours/week instead of 60+ after my daughter was born? Yep, and never regretted it. I understood that people wouldn't understand that I never was overworked in 40 hours (I only have two speeds: stop and full). I got the work done, but I wasn't visible for extra hours. Another conscious choice.
What's my point? I'm not going to say that women aren't treated differently by different groups. Politics can favor good old boys, but doesn't always. But I also have to acknowledge my own choices in this. Also, my decisions worked to my advantage as I work now for a company where that integrity and unshakeable work ethic are appreciated and rewarded. My liabilities are now my assets in an workplace where most have (literally) decades more experience, yet I hold my own.
The world has problems and injustices. I knew that some might be interested in hiring me early on BECAUSE I was a woman in a world where women were rare, but I vowed to be worth every penny they paid me. Will that make the world better for me? Maybe not. The world changes slowly. On the other hand, when my grandmother was my born, women didn't have the vote, and men could legally beat their wives to death in most states. We've come a long way.
I don't want anyone to treat me differently. The best I can do is be worth the money so the next women, so my daughter, will be treated on a more equal footing that my mother was, or even I was. But I'm not complaining. I think of the past, and I'm grateful for where I am.
One last note, my husband is a stay-at-home dad. We're a modern couple and a modern team. I think it's the people who do the best they can even under adverse circumstances that makes things better for the future. I hope I'm part of that.
In the examples I've cited it's less a matter of male versus female career paths as it is what value society places on the roles these people play. Let's face it when a Basketball player can make a multimillion dollar salary and a policeman or firefighter makes less than $100,000 there is something drastically wrong with that society and it's values.
When students are encouraged through out middle and high school to play team sports to the detriment of their academic skills, and those same schools are under staffed with regards to qualified teachers, is it any wonder our education system is such a mess?
All of these factors feed into the mindset that leaves women being discriminated
against in terms of salaries and promotions.(whether openly or covertly)