Ladies, Enjoy Your Work – For Less!
May 9th, 2012 by Kimberly
A couple of weeks back, a political issue came up, and someone said something stupid.
Not exactly a big news flash, it’s true. Probably on any given day of the year, you can count on two things: somewhere, sometime, a meterologist will forecast the wrong weather, and somewhere, sometime, a person in a political debate will say something regrettable. I guess, in these changing times, it’s good to know that some things are eternal.
The particular topic this time? The wage gap between men and women. Alex Castellanos, a conservative commentator on CNN, insisted that it doesn’t exist. Rachel Maddow, sharing airtime with him, got a little ticked off. You can watch the clip for yourself here.
Some folks will disagree with me that what Mr. Castellanos said was stupid. Some people will argue that he is right, that the Census Bureau data stating that women earn 77 cents for every dollar men earn is skewed. Indeed, the research that I’ve done on the subject indicates that some of it can be explained. Nearly every article I read, however, went on to say that a gap does exist. CNN did their own fact checking and found that Rachel Maddow was closer to the truth. The best article I found was by the American Association of University Women. (I’m sure someone will argue that the research has inherent bias, because it’s done by a group of that supports women. I would have to counter that in that case, all research by men must be discounted because it would be inherently biased the other direction, and the only fair data would have to come from single cell organisms that reproduce asexually. I couldn’t find any data from them, which tells me that single cell organisms are inherently biased against the differently gendered. However, I only have so much space here, so I will have to fight that battle another day.)
Each of these discussions finds that some of the 23% wage gap can be explained by life choices – which professions women enter, the fact that many of them choose to take years off to raise children, etc. However, all the studies I found stated that even when you accounted for all the factors – we can discuss whether or not those factors are exactly fair later – there was still a 5% gap between the sexes on a poll done for both genders one year after they graduated from college. (AAUW was the only one with subsequent statistics, and they maintain that on a similar all-factors-accounted-for poll done after ten years, the gap expands to 12%.)
How this news was related depended, as usual, on the point of view of the poster. The liberal pages said “Women are always paid less, statistics prove it!” The more conservative articles that I read said things to the effect of, “See? You’re exaggerating. There is no 23% wage gap.”
For myself personally? I can’t get past the fact that there was a 5% wage gap between equally qualified people one year out of college. Twelve months after graduating, you know what I knew? That job hunting sucked, and that rent cost a lot of money. The same was true of most of my friends. Even the ones that had more raw knowledge weren’t exactly sure how they were supposed to apply it to something. None of us, male or female, had any reason to tell an employer, “You should pay me more than that other person.” The people hiring us made that call all on their own. I’m guessing they raised or lowered the amount in inverse proportion to how badly we reeked of desperation at the time of the interview. (My stink-rating was pretty high.)
Mr. Castellanos made the argument that this couldn’t possibly be true, because if it were, greedy employers would naturally hire women in greater numbers, because they could get more out of them for less. In a twisted way, I think he points us to the heart of the controversy. What drives employers to pay someone more? I honestly don’t think it’s deliberate sexism. Most likely it’s more a matter of skewed perspective. I’m guessing that most of the time, an employer hires a man, and sees someone who is building a career and either has or will have a family to care for. An employer hires a woman, and sees someone who might dump the job to get married or go have kids, and probably has someone else around to support her anyway.
The trouble is, that isn’t reality. According to a poll by Harris Interactive for CareerBuilder.com, an increasing number of women are the sole support for their families, whether they’re married or single moms. Yes, you can argue with the methodology of the poll – for starters, the numbers of men and women weren’t even, and I don’t know how they picked them. But it stated that thirty-five percent of working moms are the sole support for their families. If the number isn’t quite that high, it’s probably close. I can think of at least five families of my acquaintance where Mom brings home the bacon. Yes, I know a number of stay-at-home moms, too, and they definitely outnumber the stay-at-home dads. But as someone who was raised by a stay-at-home dad for a number of years back in the 1980s, I can tell you that there are a lot more now than there used to be. In addition, I know a couple of women supporting elderly parents with their salaries, too. Do men do this? Of course they do. But the point is still valid. A woman looking for a job might end up having to support other people with that salary, just like her male co-applicant. Society needs to start wrapping its collective brain around that.
Of course, if I’m being honest, I was annoyed with Mr. Castellanos from the start, as I am with everyone who wants to explain away the wage gap. Let me speak from my own history here. When I graduated from college, I got an administrative job. After a few years, I decided I had never really given the attention to my creative skills that I wanted to, so I tried out for a theatre conservatory and got accepted. I was out of Corporate America for two years, and when I came back, I shied away from permanent jobs, favoring temporary work that gave me flexibility for auditions. By the time I decided that benefits and stability would be a good thing, I was 32. I went back into the job market, knowing that I wouldn’t be making as much as the 32-year-olds who had stayed the course since college. I’ve been behind some of my peers ever since.
The point? I reap the result of my own choices, and I’m fine with that. I decided to go to acting school. Do I regret it? Not for a second. I had the time of my life, learned valuable skills, wore fabulous costumes and made friends who are still a part of my life fifteen years later. It was, hands down, the best thing I’ve ever done that was just for me. Given the same decision to make today, I’d do it all again – in a heartbeat.
Like most women, I don’t mind that you pay me based on my experience and my skills. What I mind, what all of us mind, is when you pay us less than someone with a Y-chromosome who has equivalent experience and skills. And Mr. Castellanos, please don’t try to convince me that this is a trick of numbers and it doesn’t reflect real life, because here’s the thing – I wouldn’t find it so easy to believe if I hadn’t watched it happen in my own workplace. If I hadn’t trained a guy who was doing the same administrative job that I was, and watched Management quickly move him up to a position with more responsibility and more money. If I didn’t hear female co-workers tell me of similar experiences. It’s a little difficult to deal with you telling us that something doesn’t exist when we’ve seen it for ourselves. My reading tells me that the wage gap is less than it has been in the past, and I’m glad for that. But I can’t bring myself to start dancing over the fact that I’ll only be paid 12% less than a man doing my job, instead of 23%.
My tap shoes wore out years ago, and I refuse to buy new ones until the gap is statistically insignificant.
Even when the wage gap finally disappears, Kimberly still won’t buy tap shoes for herself. She will, however, buy them for Mr. Castellanos, so that he can celebrate the fact that he will finally be right about its nonexistence.
It’s like saying, “Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.” The Great and Powerful Oz ain’t that great and he needs to kick down based on skills, yes?
You’ll notice no one ever had to say “Pay no attention to the woman behind the curtain.” Everyone was ignoring her anyway.
I have known male employers who have intentionally not hired women because of the whole baby-making thing. An honestly, baby-making is a time consuming process, what with doctor appointments and sick infants and what-not, but you shouldn’t be allowed to pay an employee based on what they might do. Tap shoes or no.