Wage Gap

That 77 cents argument is based upon comparing the median salaries of men and women.  It's useful to get people riled-up but has little significance otherwise.

Women being primary caretakers of both children and other family members does make a difference even with similarly situated employees.  I don't believe the gov't should be stepping in to regulate paid family leave, but if an employer wants to provide that - more power to them.  Many of the employers that consistently grade high on best places to work offer very good policies regarding leave, remote working, child care and flexible hours.  If they can do that and compete in the market good for them - many are high tech companies that benefit from offering these perks to get the labor force they require. 

No idea how the Bureau of Labor Statistics gets their information. But according to them, of the 120 career fields that they have data on both male and female wages, there's only four where women earn more on average than men. summary, data. 

That data doesn't reflect years experience, job level, seniority, etc. It just lumps everyone in the same trade together into a single column. Not very many women were pursuing engineering degrees 40 years ago, which means upper management is naturally going to be skewed towards men and throw off the average salaries. So it makes sense when the data shows that the average male engineer earns more than the average female engineer. But if that's all it was, then you'd expect to see women earning more than men in traditionally female dominated careers. So when male teachers, maids, and nurses all have higher average salaries than their females counterparts, something doesn't add up. 

I get all that. I'm also an engineer, and every engineering seminar I've been to is overwhelmingly attended by white men. But my mom had a 40 year career as a nurse and I saw first hand that from the head nurse on down to the freshest graduate out of nursing school, that career field is dominated by women. Yet according to the BLS data, a male RN makes about 10% more than a female RN. In the other thread you said that oil field workers make more than 1st grade teachers (I don't disagree with that). But according to the BLS data, male elementary and middle school teachers make about 15% more than their female counterparts. How can you explain that without acknowledging that there's an inherit wage gap?

My wife works harder than me and makes more money than me.  Yay me!!!!

I don't buy the argument that women don't do engineering and science because they naturally don't like it. I'm a woman, I have a chemical engineering degree. I *love* math and science, but engineering school, quite frankly, was not the most appealing place to be as a woman 15 years ago. I had about 22% women in my graduating class, which was a record high for my alma mater at the time. I really wanted a good engineering degree from a good college, but was tempted more than once to switch to a school with a more diverse cross section of people. I stuck with it, but watched many female students transfer to other fields after they got sick of the culture in engineering school. These were women who loved math and science, and excelled at it, but felt overwhelmingly out of place in a male-dominated field. And this doesn't take into account the many who were discouraged before they even got out of high school. As more women enter STEM fields, this is getting better, and things are changing. I think the school I graduated from boasts more than 30% women in the current class. My daughter thinks science is cool - she's 10. There's a concentrated effort out there to teach our girls that it's cool to like science and engineering, and I see it making a difference. I think we'll see that wage gap get smaller as we have a generation who is committed to raising our girls to believe they can do whatever they want to do. 

I *do* think the way the pay gap results are reported is a skewed representation of what is really happening out there. I think there is*a gap, but not as big as that number once you normalize for all the factors you guys cite above. But it exists. In my engineering experience, I found out a few times that we were paying more for a male new hire than a female, and it made me livid. It was very much a case of "we'll offer what we have to", which I understand - women are much less likely to negotiate salary. But that doesn't really make it ok. I found it helped to work for companies with well-defined pay structure by job level, but I'm not sure everyone has the opportunity to be choosy.

I will be the feminist here (as usual, ha!) and say it's frustrating as a woman to go to mountain bike races and see the pro women, who work their off and are just as well known as the men making less money for a win on the same exact course. This isn't football, it's not like we can make any arguments there about ticket sales paying pro salaries. It's just bull*$t. It's frustrating for me, as an artist, to see that 95% of the people invited to high end museum shows are men, because it's a good old boys' club. And it's frustrating as a woman who loves math and science but didn't feel all that welcomed in school to hear guys dismiss the lack of women in STEM fields as a lack of "interest". 

So, I'll be the lone feminist here and say I welcome efforts to encourage women to enter the workforce in higher paying fields. I'm not sure regulating the pay gap is the solution, but I do think we have some work to do.

After reading several pages of statistics on the BLM page, I'm encouraged that women have been making enormous gains in the last few decades.  When my girls were in elementary school, there were only three male teachers in 5 grade levels - 1 coach, 1 theater, and 1 third grade teacher.  Unfortunately, the third grade teacher switched from teaching to being in charge of IT/Audio-Visual (which likely came with a pay raise).  There are certain fields which are dominated by males and certain fields dominated by females - unfortunately, the female dominated field tend to be the lower paying fields (teachers, nail technicians, garment manufacturing, etc.).  I know so many young girls (and no boys) that want to be teachers - children look up to same gender role models.  Luckily, my girls have a a strong working mother, female pediatrician, and have friends with mothers that are engineers and attorneys.  My girls excel at math and science, but I fear that may change when they enter high school.  Not because they lack the ability, but because the social structure is such that they want to take classes with their friends as opposed to with annoying, nerd boys.     

I'm rambling like Rogillo now.  I agree that there is a slight wage gap and I believe that it is trending in the right direction.  I don't think pushing the 77 cents argument helps the situation and, IMHO, is used as a wedge issue to divide the masses as opposed to being constructive. 

so hook'em, how would you approach the argument? Saying oh its not equal, with no numbers, is a great way to get ignored.  The reason the 77cents to the dollar argument is "pushed" is because its a simple quantifiable thing that gets people's attention.  Then they can learn about the issue and realize whats going on.

For me, I want my girls to do whats best for them - which may be becoming an engineer or may be become a hairstylist.  I want them to know how not to be taken advantage of and how to negotiate for the best deal they can receive - which might be the highest salary and might be the job with the most flexibility and benefits.  IMHO, government intervention into the contract between them and their employer is not the solution.

One trend that I find interesting is that of pay transparency (one of the factors I failed to list earlier when describing why certain companies score high on places people like to work).  Several companies have moved from hidden pay scales to published pay scales and even publishing individual salaries.  There have been many reports that the wage gap has decreased in those companies due, in large part, to the fact that salaries differences are no longer influenced by an individual's ability to negotiate.  While it might be an answer for some companies - it might not work for others.  The fact that private companies are proposing and implementing solutions to these problems is encouraging.  The fact that these changes are being done without governmental coercion is, in my mind, a positive factor of a market economy.  Should these strategies turn out to be instrumental in erasing the wage gap and employees choose employment with these companies as a result, other companies that are lose their labor force will take notice.  

You had some good points, and I was cheering for you.....   Until the end religious patriarchy lingo, which is the problem.  I am amused that this is such a male dominated discussion, but this forums has become a bit of an echo chamber.

The scotch and cigars part is a great part of the many mining conferences/camps/rendezvous in which I participate.   And I assure you that I do not look foolish.

You and Stacers are basically all we've got......if you don't pipe up it's just a bunch of idiots trying to one up each other's idiocy.  I think we're pretty damn good at it.