Warren Farrell on the ?Wage Gap?
The best recent work on the alleged wage gap was done by Warren Farrell in his book Why Men Earn More: The Startling Truth Behind the Pay Gap And What Women Can Do About It. Warren’s newest release–”How the AAUW Pay Equity Study Undermines Women”–details fallacies with the recent assertions of widespread wage discrimination against women. It is reprinted with permission below.
Warren, whom I consider the intellectual wellspring of the men’s movement, will be speaking at the Third National Men’s Equality Congress July 13-14 in Washington D.C. Warren can be reached at warren@warrenfarrell.com.
How the AAUW Pay Equity Study Undermines Women
By Warren Farrell, Ph.D.
April 24 is Pay Equity Day. Hillary Clinton is leading a protest against the alleged discrimination behind the gender pay gap, and introducing the Paycheck Fairness Act. The AAUW (American Association of University Women) is publicizing a study that appears to document the discrimination against women reflected by the gap. And restaurants are giving discounts to women to help compensate and show support.
When I was on the Board of the National Organization for Women in New York City in the seventies, I also led protests against the male-female pay gap. And I also assumed the gap reflected both discrimination against women and the undervaluing of women.
Then one day I asked myself, “If we can pay women less for the same work, why would any one hire a man?” And if they did, wasn’t there a punishment–called “going out of business?” In other words, did market forces contain a built-in punishment against discrimination?
The answer to what the pay gap was really about became more than theoretical as two daughters entered my life. After a decade of research for Why Men Earn More, I discovered 25 differences in men and women’s work-life choices. All 25 lead to men earning more money; and all 25 lead to women having better lives–lives more balanced between work and home. (Since real power is about having a better life, well, once again, the women have outsmarted us!)
As it turns out, the road to high pay is a toll road. High pay is about trade-offs. Men’s trade-offs include working more hours (women work more at home); taking more-dangerous, dirtier, and outdoor jobs (garbage collecting; construction; trucking); relocating and traveling; training for more-technical jobs with less people contact (engineering); taking late night shifts; working for more years; being absent less frequently… (more…)
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Stumble It!
April 29th, 2007 at 8:14 am
Last week in the New York City area, the media pummeled the lie that women earn less than men (because of discrimination) and of course failed to mention even one of the variables. It’s no wonder so many people are ignorant about so many things.
April 29th, 2007 at 8:18 am
My apologies. My comment should read: “[...] the media pummeled the lie into our brains [...]”
The media defended the lie…. they didn’t pummel the lie.
Me big dummy.
April 29th, 2007 at 1:14 pm
imagine this intellectually unsound, women of hysterics, hillary clinton as president..
To be honest, i dont think women can choke the men any more than they are without complete societal self-destruct..which is what we see happenning right now…
April 29th, 2007 at 3:20 pm
A couple of weeks ago I supported the Carrie Lukas article “A Bargain at 77 Cents To a Dollar” (Printed In the Washington Post and then Nationally early April) with my own letter to the editor of the Santa Rosa Press Democrat.
I wrote about how my daughter, who had receivevd an early copy of Warrens book, autographed, and who has learned about gender issues from feminist teachers, a feminist mom, and her “daddy” too. While visiting my son’s college class when she was 16. (She left home as 16, has been on her own for two years and has finshed two years of college – so, independent, smart, and “she gets it” about men’s issues) during her visit to my son’s class the male teacher said “Men get paid more” – my daughter argued that men “earn” more but she said she could tell that the male instructor was so brainwashed that he couldn’t even hear the difference between earned and paid and the idea that men do more dangerious jobs to health and life, with more stress, didn’t slow down his dogma one bit.
A female teacher wrote a reply to my letter claiming I missed the point which was “women shouldn’t get paid less than men” … she, like the male college instructor, after hearing that women get paid less, a hundred times, in twenty years, is the one who missed the point because she can’t even hear the point. My point was that people like her, and the professor, have only heard and can only repeat the feminist party line about pay equity, (Just like Hilary Clinton) and she made my point by, once again, claiming that she and other women, at some unnamed business, were paid less.
All of us should sent copies of Carrie Lucas article (Found at the Independent Women’s Forum – April 3) and a copy of Warren’s book to a few local and national politicians. Obama needs one and he needs to know that there are many of us who are “watching” as Clinton tries to sell her feminist BS about pay equity to the public. We need to have a letter writing campaign, or to collect signatures, which would accompany Warren’s book to Obama (And a few big news outlets too?)
I can’t pull this off but I think others who know how to organize such things could. Any volunteers? I will help get a few signatures if this can be done.
Local media and school presidents could use copies as well. I have sent more than one myself.
SD