Myth or Fact: Women Earn less than Men in the Workplace

Introduction

I raise the question, are women disadvantaged in the workplace? An important perspective to consider in HR is that of a hard working woman. As much as we would like to think we have come a long way in our society to reduce discrimination of any kind, statistics show that sexual discrimination is still alive and kicking in our world. Knowing this, it is important in HR to know how to recognize sexual discrimination in our organizations, and understand the proper corrective action to help reduce these injustices in the future.

Current Statistics

The following is an excerpt from a recent article Unequal Pay is Sex Discrimination illustrating the startling statistics our society faces:

“Pay Inequality - Women Earn Less Than Men Across The Board 

• Women working 41 to 44 hours per week earn 84.6% of what men earn working comparable hours.
• African American women earn only 72 cents for every dollar men earn.
• Latinas 60 cents for every dollar that men earn.
• Women who work more than 60 hours per week earn only 78.3% of what men do who work the same long hours.
• Even in jobs categories that are predominantly occupied by women (i.e. childcare), women still only make about 95% of men's wages for performing the same jobs.”

One of the first things that come to mind when pondering gender discrimination is sexual harassment in the workplace. While being degraded physically and emotionally is a very important aspect of discrimination against women in the workplace, the most difficult to recognize by the masses would be gender discrimination. Unlike sexual harassment, gender discrimination may not be so obvious at first glance. Employers sometimes put their blinders on to these types of situations because they may be more difficult to prove when the issue may be a salary issue. Because our society has stereotypes of males and females, these biases are often carried into our work life. Two candidates, one male and female, may be equally qualified based on performance and job experience. Because our stereotypes depict males as being more fit for managerial positions, when all things are equal, our stereotypes in society become prevalent in decision making. This is causing women to not be promoted as quickly as a man. When all things are equal, a man will be the first hire. I truly feel from my own experience working for a corporation for years that people may make these biased decisions on a subconscious level. Since gender discrimination has almost become taboo to talk about, many people do not seem to recognize their own short comings in the work place because we are so conditioned in society to turn a blind eye to it. The more informed we become in HR, the more we can teach employees in organization to uphold an organizations values, which should include equal opportunity for all.

Studies: Gender Discrimination in Salaries

According to the article Discrimination in Salaries, women may not even be aware of gender discrimination being done to them:

“Determinants of Perceived Discrimination

A second part of this study looks at perceptions of discrimination to determine if women and men are aware that factors extrinsic to work affect salary. A number of studies have found that although women earn less than men in a wide variety of work settings, women are not aware that they are being discriminated against (Crosby, 1982). Laboratory studies have found that a lack of awareness of discrimination may be due to an inability to see general patterns when one only has access to a few isolated examples of a common.”

According to the study done by C. Halaby, women are statistically proven to be disadvantaged in our society. “These comparisons of reduced form equations reveal that in virtually every respect women are at an economic disadvantage vis-a-vis men. This means that most of the variation in salary that is attributable to sex (30.7%, Table 1; and which may be viewed as a standardized measure of the overall level of structurally induced sexual inequality) is generated by differences in coefficients that are unfavorable to the economic interests of women. The only difference that contributes to the overall level of inequality but leaves men at a disadvantage occurs with respect to the effect of previous positions, and this is very small. Finally, we observe that for women (R-squared = .322) more than men (R-squared =.206), salary is determined by a linear combination of schooling and experience. By the same token the conditional inequality in salary is less among women (. 127) than among men (. 190). Again, these patterns repeat the findings of aggregate level analyses (Featherman and Hauser, 1976).”

Conclusion

Since R-squared is closer to 1 when looking at the female data, statistically we can infer that there is a stronger linear relationship between women’s schooling and experience than for men. Thus, we can assume that men are not solely given salaries based on criteria that our society deems appropriate for equal opportunity no matter your gender. Unfortunately, I am calling this one a fact due to the overwhelming amount of studies and articles. The most empowering course of action we can take as a woman is to not take no for an answer, and to challenge our work environments to be diplomatically equal among its employees in our day to day activities.

References

Frieze, I. H., Olson, J. E., & Good, D. C. (1990). Perceived and Actual Discrimination in the Salaries of Male and Female Managers1. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 20(1), 46-67.

Gender Discrimination - Unequal Pay is Sex Discrimination. Women in Business Networking. Retrieved April 6, 2013, from http://womeninbusiness.about.com/od/gender-inquality-issues/a/Gender-Discrimination-Unequal-Pay-Is-A-Form-Of-Gender-Discrimination.htm .

Halaby, C. N. (1979). Sexual inequality in the workplace: An employer-specific analysis of pay differences. Social Science Research, 8(1), 79-104.

Jensen, K., & Kleiner, B. H. (1999). How to determine proper corrective action following sexual harassment investigations. Equal Opportunities International, 18(2/3/4), 23-29.