10/22/2004

Equal pay for women? Not till 2050

A recent article, states that women will not achieve equal pay until the year 2050. Women currently make 78% of the wages of a man, those averages differ among different ethnic groups. According to the AFL-CIO, women will make 523,000 dollars less than a man over their lifetime. This issue is one that is very troubling to feminist equality organizations, who feel that the Equal Pay Act hasn't been applied to women as a social group.

Although this issue is one that is highly controversial, there are issues that I believe are not being fairly considered (especially by those that are crying foul the loudest). One major reason that women receive less pay over a lifetime is quite obvious; woman are different from men -- women have children. Women spend less time in the workplace, thus earning less in a lifetime. Traditionally, although the trend is being shunned, women leave the work place to rear their children. This role, although offensive to women's liberation organizations, is one that shouldn't be shoved aside. As women have left the rearing of children to day care facilities in order to take on full time careers, juvenile delinquency has skyrocketed, and America's rising generations have fallen far behind the rest of the world.

Unfortunately there are instances that woman may receive less pay than men because of simple discrimination. These occasions are deplorable. However, I believe that they are less often than women's liberation organizations would like to admit.

This article was found on CNN.com.

5 comments:

Kristin and Scottie said...

Are women not receiving equal pay because they still do not have the same education as men? Women are still expanding out into the workforce. The majority used to be at home moms. When these at home moms begin working they do not have the education behind them that men do because they went to college. Because men have the education they are able to be paid more. They should be paid more than women. Women now are going to college just like men and are becoming more popular in the workforce. Over the next 50 years more women will be recieving equal pay because they will also have more education behind them.

Women may also make less money then men over their lifetime because women are more satisfied at work. Women will take a job because they enjoy it rather than because it pays well. Men might take a job that they don't love because of the money they will receive when in reality they would be happier working elsewhere.

pramahaphil said...

The article didn't really cite any concrete reason's why other than it is believed that women seek promotions less often than men, other than that the article just harped on women's lib themes.

pramahaphil said...

A poll cited in the article did say that women are 20% plus more satisfied at work than men.

Ernie said...

Women should be equally compensated for doing the same job that a man does. I have noticed during my time here at SUU, that the female students are the ones getting the better grades and realistically are just usually better students than their male counterparts. However, women do tend to want things both ways. First, they want equal treatment in all instances unless they change their mind that day and want to go back to being treated as someone that needs protection and therefore receives more breaks in life.

Dr. Tufte said...

I think the guys could be a bit more delicate on this one.

The economic evidence is that women with the same qualifications as men get paid the same amount (a little more in fact). Thus, there is no discrimination.

But there is an appearance of discrimination obtained by using the average of all women and all men. This is a sign that women make different life choices than men. Must be smarter ones if they tend to live longer ....