The 'gender pay gap'?

Question

Why do feminists go on and on and on about this so called gender pay gap? There is no job that pays more to men or women or it would be illegal, and the fact that men earn more than women on average is just nonsense, women have children and take more time off work than men, and apart from serving on the front line in the army which was to protect women because men just seem to be expendable is now changing, the problem is women just want an easy life, and an easy job and dont want to get their hands dirty, you see in some sectors such as engineering which is a male dominated high paid job that women are hired at a rate of 5 to 1 despite having the same qualifications as the male applicants because they are trying to be seen as not sexist

Answer 1

Most people don't understand what the pay gap is all about - there IS a pay gap, but pointing it out isn't the same as saying there are jobs that are paying men more than women for the same position (though as a matter of fact that DOES happen - sorry)



It's pointing out that women have the deck stacked against them from the outset - girls are actively AND subtly discouraged from pursuing certain professions....you just have to work in early childhood education for a while to see that actually happen.



But there are plenty of other issues tied up with it. There's also the fact that women are expected to perform "unpaid" work, etc.



It's far more complicated than most people (on either side) make it out to be. But suffice to say, anyone who claims the pay gap is a "myth" is an idiot.

Answer 2

As you get at, what people often fail to realize about the gender pay gap is that it is just a small part of overall gap that exists between low wage earners and high earners. There are jobs that pay $8/hour, jobs that pay $75/hour and jobs that pay hundreds of thousands per year.



One can compare any two demographics of people in that enormous overall wage gap mix, but feminists have caused fixation on the gender wage gap portion, but there are far greater gaps. The wage gap of young and old is far greater than the male-female gap. The gap between professionals and hourly unskilled labor is also many, many times greater than the female-male gender gap.



Look at the earnings of any two demographics of people and there will be an earnings difference. It's an expected result of having jobs the pay differently and people having different jobs.



There is an enormous gap between what educators earn and others with the same educational level earn. When I worked in education, I didn't complain about this the way feminists do. I accepted and took responsibility for the fact my job choices would affect how much I earned compared to others.

Answer 3

'gender pay gap' is based on an irrational interpretation of statistical data. IE: it does not make sense!

The so called "evidence" of this is based on manipulating data, and juvenile interpretations of economics.

This method is not scientific or clinically accurate.

For example: Corporation (A) can only afford to employ four executives on high sallary. After months of recruitment they select candidates based on merit, experience and qualifications. This turns out to be three men and one woman from the pool of available labour. They all have exactly the same duties, responsibilities and sallary.

Corporation (B) is a smaller company, and can only afford to employ two executives on high sallary. Using the exact same recruitment methods as corporation (A) and based on the pool of available labour at that time, they employ two men. They have exactly the same duties and responsibilities as corporation (A) but are paid slightly more. Now, when you suddenly start randomly averaging things out in this senario you will always get a result that shows women are paid less than men.IE:

Corporation (A) has an under representation of women by more than 50% (1:3)

Corporation (B) has no female representation at all (0:2)

The $$ amounts for the exact same roles with the same responsibilities are skewed, because the one woman is compared to an organisation that does not even employ her, and both organisations data are used to generalise what the sallary should be for this specific role.

This kind of methodology is biased and not representative of the real world.

Answer 4

It is true that, at this point, the wage gap is... at best, a bit overstated. I don't think it's an actual lie, even still. It's just that the reasons for it aren't simple, direct bias.



For example, female-dominated professions, such as education and nursing, are underpaid relative to education-equivalent male dominated professions, such as engineering and IT. Looked at on a men vs women basis for all of society, this will result in a fairly large pay gap. Looked at on a job-by-job basis, there may be no bias at all. And it's reasonable to ask how much of that pay difference is due to legitimate differences in how much society needs those jobs, and/or how many people are willing to do them, vs undervaluing of "women's work".



Another source of the pay gap is women staying home to take care of the kids. Obviously and reasonably, if a woman is out of the work force for 15 years or so, she will not be making the same as her age-mates when she returns to work. But, how much of that is reasonable reaction to the difference in experience, vs denigration or disparagement of women who didn't "put their careers first", and how much of the bias in women vs men being full-time parents is due to the actual inclinations and abilities of the parties involved vs child-care being "women's work"?



And, well, even excluding those differences in jobs and hours worked, there's still around a 5 percent difference in pay that is unaccounted-for. That is, a 5 percent overall difference in total pay even when comparing men and women who worked the *same* jobs, for the *same* hours, with the *same* qualifications. So don't try to tell me that there's no wage gap.

Answer 5

Why? Seems to me that there could only be two reasons. Either they are knowingly misleading people or they are ignorant. I don't think politicians and feminist organizations are ignorant to the facts, so I believe they are simply being deceptive. The question is - what's their end game?



The masses who believe that the purported "wage gap" measures the "same work" are mostly just ignorant - often willfully ignorant.

Answer 6

In reality, I believe the pay gap no longer exists. It was a thing of the past. My wife and I are both engineers. We went to the same school and studied the same degree and had virtually the same GPA and we have the same job title, both working in manufacturing. It has been five years since we graduated and she has always got paid at least $5000 more than me. It has nothing to do with being male or female. She is just a better negotiator when it comes to salary.

Answer 7

It is usually the left that push this nonsense, in order to herd women like cattle right to the polls. You see it nearly every election cycle.



"I am a victim" is THE excuse many people have to explain away why they suck at the free market. Everything is always someone else's fault. Nobody has to take personal responsibility.



This is why socialism is starting to get tremendous support in the West. There is a huge voting bloc of people with an entitlement mentality, who feel people owe them a living. And their numbers equal political power. People like this get socialists elected, who in turn tear at the very capitalistic fabric of this nation.



There isn't a company that pays men more just for being a man. Most corporations who receive funding from the government are bound by strict affirmative action policies, policies they cannot violate, or they breach their contracts and LOSE their funding. These companies not only have to treat women fairly, they have to FAVOR them. They are NOT going to pay women less because they are women because such a move goes against their best interests. It makes no kind of business sense.



The "sexist pay gap" is just one more sh*tty feminist fairy tale that belongs in a story book that is collecting dust on a shelf somewhere.

Answer 8

The fact that you don't understand the pay gap doesn't mean it isn't real.

Answer 9

Haven't spent much time in reality, have you?



"There is no job that pays more to men or women or it would be illegal"

By what law? No such law has ever been successfully passed.



Have you ever known any women? I have. I've seen the pay gap first hand. Seen churches do it with pastors. Seen how average pay in professions goes down when they become dominated by women.



No facts in the rest of your rant either.

Answer 10

No matter what anyone says, or how many statistics, or how many studies you cite, the fact remains, if there were a pay gap, women would be a majority in the workforce. Why pay a man if you can hire a woman for less?? If I could hire a workforce for 5% or so less, I could nearly double my net income. It just does NOT work that way!!!!

Answer 11

It's been the law for a long time.





http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/statutes/epa.cfm

(1) No employer having employees subject to any provisions of this section shall discriminate, within any establishment in which such employees are employed, between employees on the basis of sex by paying wages to employees in such establishment at a rate less than the rate at which he pays wages to employees of the opposite sex

Answer 12

Feminazis like Ya Coffee won't stop despite the fact they are already more than equal.

Answer 13

....is bullshit that you are being fed by the media and politicians and you're falling for it hook. line and sinker. Its non existent.

Answer 14

They like to complain about imaginary problems they face while ignoring real problems other people face.

Answer 15

Because of the metric system.