Re: I really hope Obama does not win the nomination

On Sat, 5 Jan 2008 23:10:38 -0800 (PST), Ryan <ryan_degama@xxxxxxxx>
wrote:

On Jan 6, 2:08 am, SMBalloon <smball...@xxxxxxx> wrote:
On Sat, 5 Jan 2008 22:26:15 -0800 (PST), Ryan <ryan_deg...@xxxxxxxx>
wrote:

Women should receive equal pay for equal work.

If women could be hired for less for doing the same work at the same
level of quality and the same level of productivity as men, then why
would any astute business owner ever look to hire a man?  Answer:
They wouldn't.  Reality is that men and women, for all intents and
purposes, are paid comparably for equal work.  Regardless of any
political rhetoric claiming otherwise and regardless of the
brainwashing we've all been subject to our entire lives.    

I ask quite humbly, as I don't know the answer as it applies to the
U.S. - do the facts bear this out?

from: http://www.iwf.org/news/show/18983.html

Working Girl
by Arrah Nielsen
July 15, 2005

Feminist groups have parroted the statistic that women earn only 76
cents to the male dollar so many times that it is seldom challenged by
the mainstream media or anywhere else in the popular culture. Feminist
groups imply that the wage gap is due to discrimination and that all
women are victims.

But college women getting ready to graduate and find a job should take
heart. The wage gap is a misleading statistic that fails to account
for several crucial factors impacting women's wages such as:

Time worked. Women take much more time out of the work force and
assume a greater share of the domestic load. Long, uninterrupted
employment correlates with higher wages.
College majors and career choices. Women disproportionately major in
the social sciences and enter lower paying, but more personally
fulfilling, careers such as elementary education and social work.
Bachelor's degrees in the hard sciences and technology command higher
incomes than those in the liberal arts.
Playing it safe. Women are generally less willing than men to take
dangerous or unpleasant jobs that offer higher wages to offset the
extra risk.
In short, it is women's life and career choices -- not a patriarchal
conspiracy -- that result in women earning less than men. The best way
to boost women's earnings is to inform them of why men earn more and
leave the choices and the consequences up to them.

Introduction
No doubt, you've heard feminists parrot the statistic that women earn
only 76 cents to the male dollar. Senator John Kerry repeated this
statistic in the fall on the campaign trail, as did Kim Gandy of the
National Organization for Women. The 76 cents statistic has been
repeated so often that most people simply take it at face value.

It probably has made the fun job of looking for post-graduation
employment that much better, since you are preparing to get gypped as
well as get a job. But take heart: as the real facts about the wage
gap reveal, women can make just as much money as men. It all depends
on the choices that you make.

What Is the Wage Gap?
Equal pay for equal work has been enforced by the Equal Employment
Opportunity Act since it was made law in 1972. The Equal Pay Act of
1963 and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 also banned
sex-based wage discrimination. So it seems pretty remarkable that the
wage gap is so wide and pervasive today. Attorneys should be having a
field day with class action law suites over this grave injustice. But
they are not. Could it be that even the legal establishment is itself
involved in this glaringly obvious patriarchal conspiracy?

Fortunately, no. The wage gap is a misleading statistic. It compares
all women to all men. Thus, the male orthopedic surgeon working in
excess of 70 hours per week is tossed in alongside the female
receptionist working 40 hour weeks. The statistic does not take into
account the level of education, the years of work, and the choice of
education. And these factors can have a big impact on how much money
you make.

For example, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports "that the average
person working 45 hours per week earns 44 percent more pay -- that is,
44 percent more pay for 13 percent more work." In other words, a small
difference in number of hours worked can add up to a big difference in
dollars earned. Women are 50 times more likely than men to take time
out of the workforce, for care-giving and other reasons. This
difference should not be overlooked when trying to get at the roots of
the wage gap.

When males and females in the same occupation, with similar
qualifications and experience, are compared there is virtually no
difference in their pay. A definitive study of the gender wage gap
conducted by economist June O'Neill, former director of the
Congressional Budget Office, found that women earn 98 percent of what
men do when controlled for experience, education, and number of years
on the job.

The Real Reason for the Wage Gap: The Choices Women Make
Warren Farrell, three time board of directors member of the National
Organization for Women (NOW) New York City, points out in Why Men Earn
More that one reason men earn more than women is because they are far
more likely to take unpleasant and dangerous jobs, what Farrell calls
the "death and exposure professions." For example, firefighting, truck
driving, mining, and logging are just a few high risk jobs that are
over 95 percent male. Conversely, low risk jobs, like secretarial work
or childcare, are over 95 percent female.

Farrell points out that in California, prison guards can earn $70,000
per year in addition to full medical benefits, and retire after 30
years with a hefty retirement package. But it takes little imagination
to figure out why California still has a difficult time staffing its
prisons, and it goes without saying that most prison guards are male.
Says Farrell, "As with most jobs, there?s an inverse relationship
between fulfillment and pay."

Because men are more likely to take jobs that are unpleasant,
dangerous, or dull in exchange for higher pay, they reap the financial
benefit. Farrell summarizes this phenomenon this way: "jobs...that
expose you to the sleet and the heat pay more than those that are
indoors and neat." Individual women could choose to enter more risky
but higher paying professions, but most choose not to.

There is little evidence to suggest that women earn less than men
merely because they are women. In fact, according to the 1960 U.S.
Census of Population, a decade before the Equal Pay Act was passed,
never married childless college-educated white women who worked full
time were earning 106 percent of what their male counterparts were
making. Furthermore, Warren Farrell documents occupations requiring
bachelor's degrees in which women's starting salaries actually exceed
men's. Female investment bankers and dieticians, for example, can
expect to earn 116 percent to 130 percent of their male counterparts'
salaries.

Why then do women earn less than men? The primary reason is that on
average maximizing earnings is less of a priority for women than it is
for men. Men are 50 times more likely than women to be the primary or
sole breadwinners for their families, and even well-educated women,
who are presumably more ambitious than the average Jane, are less
committed to their careers and less willing to make sacrifices for
them. Surveys of female MBAs reveal that ten years after graduation,
20 percent do not work at all, having opted out of the work force in
favor of being stay-at-home moms. A Korn/Ferry study revealed that
only 14 percent of women, compared to 46 percent of men, say they
actually want to be a CEO.

Comparable Worth? Comparable to What?
But feminist organizations like the National Organization for Women
and the Ms. Foundation don't accept these differences in decisions as
the real reason for differences in pay. They argue that
female-dominated occupations are undervalued. Thus they insist that
women who enter occupations such as elementary education and
secretarial work, which have low starting pay and little opportunity
for advancement, are victims of an economic system that undervalues
and under-compensates their work. They argue for "comparable worth"
legislation that would have the government decide how much professions
ought to be paid in order that secretaries make the same wage as truck
drivers.

To proponents of comparable worth, the mere fact that female-dominated
occupations such as secretarial work and childcare pay less than
male-dominated jobs like construction work, which require less
education, is concrete proof that women are being unfairly
discriminated against. What feminists and other comparable worth
proponents overlook is that it is the market, not anonymous committees
of wage makers, that determines what employees are paid. Comparable
worth? Comparable to what?

Comparable worth was implemented in Australia in the 1970s, and while
it failed to close the gender wage gap, it succeeded in creating labor
shortages. "A 10 percent gap for full time workers and a 20 per cent
gap for all workers remains, mainly because women have different
labour force characteristics than men."

Minnesota experienced similar problems with comparable worth.
University of Virginia economist Stephen Rhoads showed in his book
Incomparable Worth that "pay equity" in Minnesota resulted in
depressed wages and labor shortages in crucial occupations such as
nursing and computer engineering. Furthermore, while the city of St.
Paul spent an additional $32 million on salary expense between 1985
and 1992, debate raged on about which occupations were being
compensated fairly and whether Minnesota was in compliance with the
law at all.

In a free market, wages are a compromise between what employees are
willing to work for and what their employers are willing to pay them.
Instituting comparable worth will ultimately only hurt women and the
economy by making women more expensive to employ, under-compensating
certain professions causing labor surpluses and shortages, and
stifling economic growth. There is simply no way that unelected
bureaucrats can synthesize the full volume of information reflected in
wage rates. The most accurate labor statistics available run a year
behind...Wages are most accurately and fairly determined by the free
association of labor participants.

Hearth and Home
Another reason women's average earnings are less than men's is that
they tend to shoulder a greater share of the domestic load at home,
and take more time out of the workforce for care-giving. Women more
than men adjust their work schedules to accommodate their families.
And in poll after poll, they express a preference to do so.

"Well, why can't men and women share domestic responsibilities 50-50
so women will be just as free and unencumbered as men are?" the
conventional feminist argument goes. Some couples manage to create
such an arrangement, but in general couples typically find it easier
for each partner to specialize and make the sacrifices required to
sustain the family. Most couples find that one career has to give when
children come along and it is usually the mother's.

Scholars can debate whether it is societal pressure or innate desire
that makes women elect to spend more time with their children. But so
long as these decisions are a reflection of women's expressed
preferences, this isn't a problem that needs to be solved.

Case Study: You
What factors are you taking into account as you start looking for a
job? Probably potential earnings are just one of many factors you are
considering before entering a career field. Personal fulfillment,
safety, job flexibility, and working conditions weigh in along with
salary.

It is wrong to assume that maximizing earnings is the primary goal of
every worker. The important thing is that everyone is free to make
their own decisions and is constrained only by the talent and ambition
they possess. If women earn less than men as a result of their own
choices and preferences, than that is an outcome we should be willing
to accept.

Conclusion
Feminists have ignored how women's lives and goals differ from men's.
In doing so they have overlooked the fact that it women's life choices
-- not sex discrimination -- are responsible for the infamous wage
gap. In order for women to reach absolute parity with men, they will
have to work full time all the time, and choose career paths that pay
more, but are less flexible and fulfilling. This recipe for equality
is at odds with what most women want, but that does not seem to matter
to feminists pushing the notion that women are shortchanged
economically. They have mistaken equal opportunity for equal outcomes.

Understanding the reasons why men earn more than women, not promoting
the paranoid, tiresome notion that women are victims, is the key to
boosting earnings. It is the knowledge of how individual choices
impact workplace earnings -- not divisive ideology -- that will
empower women. College women should take note: the truth will set you
free.

(end of commentary)
.

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