Do You Get Pay Less Because You’re Female?
Posted by Cap in Even More Ramblings on April 23, 2007 |
Yes.
If you live in the United States and you’re female, according to the 2005 Census statistics (graphed above), you’re most likely getting paid less.
What are the factors? Discrimination or choices in life?
The answer is apparently because of discrimination, according to a recent CNN article which reported on the research results from the American Association of University Women Educational Foundation.
The foundation is aimed at promoting education and equity for women and girls, so the report may be biased. Still, results from research like these are always an eye opener.
One year out of college, women working full time earn 80 percent of what men earn, according to the study… Ten years later, women earn 69 percent as much as men earn.
Specifically, the percentages that are attributed to gender is 5 percent one year after graduation and 12 percent 10 years after graduation (thanks to samerwriter for pointing this out).
The widening gap accounts for factors in number of hours worked and changes in life situation (such as parenthood). In short, as the research reported, if a woman and man make the same choice, they will not receive the same pay.
As most of you know, I am of the male gender — pending any future life choices (just kidding I’ll stay male, thank you very much). In my life situation, I don’t see the pay gap reported from researches like above. Of course, I’m certainly not ignorant enough to discount reports such as these just because they don’t apply to my surroundings. (Especially since most of the females in my life are starting work in high-demand fields such as pharmacy and nursing).
This blog has a good number of female readers, and although its entirely unscientific to simply ask, I’ll ask away anyway: Do you get pay less because you’re female and do you believe its discrimination or choices in life?
Related Links:
- Male-female income disparity in the US — Wikipedia
- Behind the Pay Gap — AAUW.org
33 Comments to “Do You Get Pay Less Because You’re Female?”
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April 23rd, 2007 at 10:14 am
I’ve been totally discriminated against in jobs for being female. In that case, the guy who made the copies got 10k more than I got, for a job that required a master’s degree. I’ve also been paid less because of my temperment. I don’t aggressively pursue raises and I don’t aggressively pursue higher salaries. When I switch jobs, I ask for 10% more to switch. My male colleagues ask for much more, and get signing bonuses and extra days off, etc. I don’t pursue those things, I don’t get them. However, I think it’s pretty stinky of businesses to not at least make an attempt to match these things when they hire someone who comes more highly-recommended and who gets more done. I end up leaving for a better offer, and it’s only then that all the raises and bonuses and sugar come out to try to convince me to stay (I never take it, I’m dumb, but not that dumb.)
April 23rd, 2007 at 10:39 am
“Yes, the foundation is aimed at promoting education and equity for women and girls, so the report may be biased.”
Read that sentence again please.
How do you figure that a foundation aimed at promoting EDUCATION and EQUITY for women and girls “may be biased.”?
April 23rd, 2007 at 11:30 am
thanks for sharing a.h.
p.fox: sorry but not sure what you mean? I just mean that the report may be biased in that they may be specifically looking for a certain result from their research. perhaps I should get rid of the word “yes,” that was poor wording.
April 23rd, 2007 at 11:50 am
I’d be happy at this point to have any full-time job, which seem to be in short supply in this area, and I’d quibble about the pay later. I got a MA so I could make more and I’m not even making enough to support myself.
So it would be a yes, but I’m in special circumstances I think.
April 23rd, 2007 at 12:11 pm
It’s interesting that the headlines claim “women earn 80% what men earn”, but the story explains that gender only accounts for 5% of the pay difference.
That’s quite a difference. I guess “Women earn 95% as much as men” doesn’t grab attention quite the same way.
For what its worth, in my industry (semiconductors) I have anecdotal evidence indicating that women earn *more* than men, because employers are so desperate to retain technical women.
April 23rd, 2007 at 1:33 pm
I think equal pay should be given for equal work. However, an employer has to figure in the value of an employee by the chances of the employee becoming pregnant and also being highly emotional during PMS. Does that help account for pay discrepencies? What are the attendence rates for men vs. women? Are they the same or different? Also, A.H. says that she does not aggressivly pursue higher pay rates when going into a new job, doesn’t that account for something? Naturally, men are more agressive than women. Don’t you agree that therefore, like in A.H.’s case, women are less likely to fight for higher rates?
April 23rd, 2007 at 1:33 pm
I work at a company that is 95% female. My boss says that he hires more women than men because they have more attention to detail and they tend to be more focused. I think the real reason is that he can get away with paying lower salaries.
April 23rd, 2007 at 1:42 pm
Hey Bert, did you for serious bring up PMS? I mean, really? I’d think that if that is an actual issue, it is offset by the added aggression in men because of their constant wash of testosterone.
I absolutely brought up the fact that I don’t fight for raises as a probable cause for any discrepancy in my pay. I am unmarried, have no children, and am never sick. I suspect that if managers started to rebalance pay rates based on actual performance rather than squeaky wheels, there might be more equity.
I also note a tendancy for women to apply and pursue jobs that they KNOW they can do, while men tend to apply for anything that seems sort of like a fit. They also (speaking as a former hiring manager) tend to exaggerate their accomplishments more in interviews, while women tend to downplay.
These are, of course, general tendencies. There are brassy, confident women and modest, retiring men.
April 23rd, 2007 at 1:46 pm
I don’t know if I get paid less than my male counter-parts. I have never seen their paystubs, but I think less pay for women is common. ’nuff said.
April 23rd, 2007 at 6:36 pm
Hey everyone. I always thought that the better pay of males was due to taking riskier jobs, or more chances in general. Check this link out and let me know what you think!
http://www.warrenfarrell.com/pages.php?id=18
April 23rd, 2007 at 6:40 pm
If this statistic was true, why would any company hire men? As a single woman 40+ woman without children working for a top five engineering firm, this sort of thing p@sses me off!
April 23rd, 2007 at 6:59 pm
I think it all depends. I have always earned more than my husband, but then again, I also have a graduate degree and more student loan debt. I am a supervising librarian with a public library, and he is a bio-engineer. Currently, I earn $72k/year while he is in the mid-50’s. He has always been my biggest cheerleader and is proud to say that I outearn him. I think that if women arm themselves with a good education and take advantage of the right opportunities in the right field, the sky is the limit. I also think that Generation X-er’s, like myself, will have TONS of opportunities in the future once all of the baby-boomers retire and die off…
April 23rd, 2007 at 11:14 pm
I think it does have a lot to do with the fact that women are meeker about asking for pay raises. I think we assume that because we work every ounce as hard as the men in the office, our employers will recognize this and pay us accordingly. My first job out of college, I was a reporter earning so little money that the city slipped information about public assistance for energy bills under the doors in my apartment complex. I was an Ivy league graduate and worked up to 18 hours a day. I was thus incensed to learn that all of the men in the office earned more. (And Bert, your comment about PMS is extremely ignorant. I work just as hard as anyone I know, thank you.)
Now I am in law school and will start at at least $140K a year when I graduate, before bonuses. (It’s going up about $10k a year so who knows what it will be when I graduate) Law firm salaries are set, so you do not have to bargain for raises.
Still, I think women should have to be taught how to advocate for themselves aggressively, especially considering that we still live in a man’s world. Men and women think differently, and since men are still doing the hiring in many circumstnaces, women have to know how to play in their court.
Oh, and I will be making much, much more than my husband, and he feels blessed!
April 24th, 2007 at 5:17 am
Sorry, A.H., Just trying to rationalize why an employer would pay less money to a lady. I guess you can’t talk about the differences betweeen a man and a woman anymore.
April 24th, 2007 at 9:42 am
Whenever I find out a male is making more then me when I deserve the same if not more I stand up and say something about it. I tell the boss it doesn’t matter if I’m a female I deserve to get paid just as much as him. Every female needs to do this.
April 24th, 2007 at 9:49 am
I think it’s interesting reading about these people with master’s degrees that hardly earn anything and work 18 hours a day. I would never accept that. I would move to a place that paid more or keep bugging the current emplyer for more money. I’ve been out of school only a year; I have a bachelor’s. I work 40 hrs a week Mon.-Thur. with an awesome starting pay/benefits. I didn’t get in by being nice though. I kept calling and calling and just weaseled my way in. By the way, I am a woman.
April 24th, 2007 at 10:30 am
Jodi,
I think the reason I have an MA and don’t earn much at all, is that I wasn’t willing to move out of state until recently. 2.5 years of hunting here and I’m done. So now I’m willing to move, but it’s the lack of experience that’s getting me. I never would have gotten the MA if I could have traded it for full-time work somewhere five years ago!
I only got it because I thought it would help, since my skills are very specialized.
April 24th, 2007 at 6:15 pm
My one sucky boss didn’t mean to discriminate but he always talked football with the male workers and thus became friends with them. I tried to talk football bu t that didn’t work out that well.
April 24th, 2007 at 8:53 pm
Hey Susan,
I don’t understand why any company would voluntarily hire women. You being 40ish, no kids, working in technology is the exception to the rule. I dated a girl that would take off 2 days a month for “pains”. Another coworker left for maternity leave and the day prior to returning stated I am not coming back. Gee thanks for the notice! If a woman brings a baby into the office all productivity ceases for the afternoon as the women congregate for a two hour gabbing session. Sure women may earn less in some professions since in typical American business, they contribute less.
April 24th, 2007 at 9:21 pm
Speaking as one of the few women who is naturally as aggressive as men are…other women will try to beat all sense of assertiveness & aggressiveness out of you.
If a woman is assertive about the right way to get something done, she’ll be told to play nice and be more welcoming of everyone else’s ideas. The man would be thanked for his insight and possibly promoted.
This happens daily where I work, and there are right and wrong answers in what I do. It’s number-based; it’s not like advertising design where there are shades of grey. If you don’t get the work done correctly, you SHOULD be required to learn a new process. Instead, I get “you can’t tell people how to do things”. If you weren’t screwing up, I wouldn’t ever know how you did them. If a man had my job and had a great idea for process improvement…yep, promotion-ready.
April 24th, 2007 at 10:34 pm
I find the whole “women get paid less” thing pretty ridiculous. Most larger companies have “pay ladders”, with employees of any gender filling appropriate rungs and getting paid accordingly. I have never heard of a woman in a Manager II position getting paid less than a man in a Manager II position.
However, men in general tend to occupy more dangerous positions, construction, roofing, welding, etc., hence the larger paychecks.
I swear to ya’ll, every boss 2 levels up at my current IT job is a woman … We’re talking 8 women making $100K+.
April 25th, 2007 at 9:59 am
Allan,
I don’t understand why any company would voluntarily hire you. Being as closed-minded as you are, there is no company that would benefit from your lack of credibility. Businesses progress with innovation, but you are unwilling to accept diversity and change because you are so closed-minded. I feel deeply sorry for you; you will have a difficult life.
April 25th, 2007 at 11:17 am
My choices have definitely kept my salary low. I insist on working at low-stress jobs that require only 40 hours per week and are stable. I keep a job as long as I keep liking it. I don’t quit until I have a new job lined up. And now that I’m only 8 years from retiring with a really good pension, I’m not even looking at other employers, even though my current employer (a university) pays some of the lowest wages of any large employer in my town.
So although I’ve been working for the state for twenty years and I have a masters degree and a job that requires a masters degree, I still make only $39,000 per year, which is just a tiny bit more than a first-year teacher in my area makes.
I also don’t ask for raises or lobby the state Congress for raises–duh, like they don’t know I want a raise? However at least I am good at evaluation time about bringing up all the many things I do that my bosses might not otherwise know about.
On the other hand I do not have kids and am lucky to not have such bad PMS or any other problems that require me to take a lot of sick time. So that part of me is more stereotypically male.
April 25th, 2007 at 11:44 am
woah, careful guys. let’s tackle ideas but not the individuals. I think Bert was just trying to point out some differences, as he mentioned. some people definitely do experience more severe menstruation, the cramps are no joke!
lots of great comment. there is definitely an amount of choice involve from some of the comments, and as mentioned, the demeanor some females take toward job opportunity (and it’s in my opinion certainly not a bad/good thing).
April 26th, 2007 at 3:16 pm
being highly emotional during PMS.
(A) I handle my emotions extremely well at work, thank you and (B) I have worked for men who throw tiny child temper tantrums when perfectly ordinary problems occur. No one who’s emotionally unstable “deserves” a job, but please don’t assume women have more problems with this than men.
Naturally, men are more agressive than women.
Nothing natural about it. I was never taught to be meek and take my place behind men like a good girl, so I have no trouble making a case for what I deserve. And when I’m dealing with good people, I get what I deserve.
Unfortunately, assertiveness is prized in men but seen as unladylike, so I’ve lost a number of jobs because I was – and I quote from the headhunter – “too strong” or “might intimidate the other gals at the office”. So it doesn’t matter that I’m capable of asserting myself in instances where I’m dealing with people who can’t stomach the idea of a woman who doesn’t just smile prettily and say “thank you!” for whatever you hand her.
Where I work, there is no question women are paid less for the same labor that men do. And it’s an advanced technical field that’s hungry for women. I’m not talking about women who have babies: I’m talking two young kids, straight out of college, both working 80 hour weeks. The boys make more because they’re offered more. They don’t do a better job bargaining for it. They’re simply offered more.
And the perception persists that “men have families to support!” despite the number of widows and divorced women who obviously have families AND babysitters to support.
April 26th, 2007 at 3:19 pm
Whoops! I meant that I’d not been hired for a number of jobs because I struck someone as “too strong” – the way I phrased it, it could read like I’ve been fired and that’s absolutely not the case. Everyone I’ve actually worked for has expressed nothing but satisfaction with my abilities and attitude.
April 26th, 2007 at 3:39 pm
It is my impression that I could earn more than my husband if I wanted to work right now. I have a PhD in computer science (as does he), and universities are desperate to hire female professors in computer science/engineering to provide role models for future female engineers. It would certainly be easier for me to get a job.
Luckily, he is already a professor and is well paid enough to allow me to stay home with our kids.
I don’t think it is fair that women are paid less in general, but I can see the concern that managers would have with hiring women. Woman go on maternity leave, women sometimes don’t return from maternity leave, and women are more likely to need to take sick days to care for sick children. From a productivity point of view, women as a whole are less effective workers. This totally screws the women who aren’t mothers or are but are somehow able to put their career first, because the unreliability of women (compared to men) is completely child-rearing based. Women are still (generally) the primary caregivers, and are expected to put family first and work second. Men are expected to put work first, and are therefore expected to be more reliable. Pay should not reflect that, but it probably does.
That’s a problem in our society and I have no solution for that. I hope someone can figure it out!
April 26th, 2007 at 9:53 pm
After rereading the article one thing seems to be overlooked; are the women and men surveyed performing the same job? It sounds to me that the survey was limited to full time working adults for an entire year. A survey would be skewed if comparing the salary of my coworkers in the I.T. department with the full-time secretary downstairs.
Just like Jodie, our opinionated licensed psychologist here, I find financial and career success by working hard, constantly learning new skills, and taking some risks such as new employment. Anyone can move ahead in salary and responsibilities, men or women. But look at any high ranking self-made executive in a large company. They never got there by taking days off, playing on the Internet at work, wasting time talking about nothing, or disappearing from the workforce.
“I can’t believe I am paid so much to talk” – Oprah
April 26th, 2007 at 11:16 pm
i think i’m doing pretty well,although, i don’t know what other men in my position earn. i am the youngest on my team (on average by about 10 to 15 years), and i am one of two females. i am a project manager working on my master’s degree. this year i’ll make $86K. my husband already has his master’s, and he’ll make just under $80K.
i’ve always read that women earn less, but i also think in general, women aren’t as technical or agressive as the men.
i think in a lot of cases i earn more than most other women b/c i try so hard and i am so agressive.
i think earnings are within control….someone just has to go for it.
April 29th, 2007 at 9:51 am
And just as Allan says, neither did anyone become a high ranking executive by hiding reams of invoices in their cubes from their co-workers and managers. (Which is a true story from my office. HE hid them for months and cost us an arm and a leg.)
Everyone can find a slacker in the office. It’s not just women, Allan. I’m sorry the women in YOUR particular office do that, but the MALE smokers in MY office have wasted just as much time running up and down the stairs to smoke. AND I subsidize their children’s health insurance and their smoker’s premium with my single female non-smokers premium.
May 1st, 2007 at 7:07 pm
As a woman with a MS in engineering profession I would agree that women earn less than men. This is due to many reasons listed above and some more subtle ones. Personally I’ve noticed since coming back from maternity leave that it was very difficult for me to get work on good jobs. Consistantly it was given to people I trained instead of me even though I’d performed outstandingly in the past. Women have to be far superior than male peers to get equal respect and pay. I also think men naturally prefer to work with other men. And from hearing from my husband (another engineer) about the vulgar and sexually explicit way men talk at work when women aren’t around I’m not surprised.
A good book to read is called “Women Don’t Ask.” It’s all about women and negotiation and such. It discusses a lot of the other issues that people listed, including female assertiveness being viewed as itchy or pushy and failure of women to negotiate salary. The book also cites a study that was done where they had a man enter a meeting late and a women enter a morning meeting late – the people in the meeting naturally assumed that the woman had child care issues, but the man’s tardiness was overlooked.
November 28th, 2008 at 1:48 pm
I am writing a college paper on this and it so bad that men get paid more than women. I just couldn’t believe this. I hope that somehow this change in the future because I really do think that there are more women in this world than men.