understanding the pay gap
It irks me that progressive communities are hesitant (and hostile) to discussions surrounding the dishonest and popular pay gap stat:Â âwomen earn 78 cents on for every dollar men doâ. Not because I donât think itâs an important issue to tackle, but because the number is so simplified and misleading.Â
Hereâs a quote from the Bernie Sanders campaign website:
Fighting for pay equity by signing the Paycheck Fairness Act* into law. It is an outrage that women earn just 78 cents for every dollar a man earns.
The problem isnât that simple! Workplace wage-discrimination only accounts for a few pennies of that gap! The rest is about under- (and over-) representation in over- (and under-) paid industries, and the differences in hours worked (due largely to housework burdens).Â
Bernieâs legislation just scratches the surface. Thatâs not to say you shouldnât support the bill, but the idea that itâs a one-and-done deal hamstrings further progress. Inevitably, if you donât accurately characterize the problem, youâll get shitty solutions.
Not only that but it plays into the âunsayable truths of the leftâ like âthe wage gap mythâ or âthe facts about Islamâ that encourage migration to alt-right views. Hereâs a great quote from this article addressing that:
âThis problem presents itself when it comes to âthe often highly literate, highly intelligent people who gravitate to the alt-right: internet savvy, media savvy, who often are radicalized in that way, who âswallow the red pill,â as the saying goes, the allusion from âThe Matrix.ââ
Mr. Pinker goes on to argue that when members of this group encounter, for the first time, ideas that he believes to be frowned upon or suppressed in liberal circles â that most suicide bombers are Muslim or that members of different racial groups commit crimes at different rates â they are âimmediately infected with both the feeling of outrage that these truths are unsayableâ and are provided with âno defense against taking them to what we might consider to be rather repellent conclusions.â
Thatâs unfortunate, Mr. Pinker argues, because while someone might use these facts to support bigoted views, that neednât be the case, because âfor each one of these facts, there are very powerful counterarguments for why they donât license racism and sexism and anarcho-capitalism and so on.â
There is a rhetorical, âshock valueâ strategy is at work here that needs to be replaced with honest discussion. Alternative facts are never ok, even if you agree with the message. Having these conversations shouldnât make you a traitor to the movement.Â
*a bill that "punishes employers for retaliating against workers who share wage information, puts the justification burden on employers as to why someone is paid less and allows workers to sue for punitive damages of wage discrimination."
