On Palin and the Truth about Women’s Income

Governor Palin’s recent campaign trail comments, regarding equal pay for women, appear to pander to gender feminist interests. Her comments appear misleading at best and quite possibly disingenuous.

Palin, at the very least, appeared intent on parroting Marxist, gender feminist rhetoric, when she said:

“Are you willing to break the highest, hardest glass ceiling in America?”

and:

“When the time came to make a decision, Barack Obama couldn’t bring himself to pick the woman who got eighteen million votes in the primary,” Palin said of Obama’s vice presidential pick, comparing it to the discrimination women face in the workplace every day. “The qualifications are there, but for some reason the promotion never comes … You’ve got to ask yourself, why wasn’t Senator Hillary Clinton even vetted by the Obama campaign?”

and:

“There is a difference between what Barack Obama says and what he does,” she declared. “Out on the stump, he talks about things like equal pay for equal work, but according to Senate records, women on his staff get just 83 cents for every dollar that the men get. What is with that? Does he think that the women aren’t working as hard? Does he think they’re 17 percent less productive?“

Gender discrimination in pay for performance of equal work, has been illegal since the passage of the Civil Rights Act (1964). Today in America, gender discrimination in pay for performance of equal work is virtually non-existent. If it weren’t, don’t you think we’d be seeing it plastered all over daily news broadcasts?

Here is a brief excerpt from the Civil Rights Act (1964):

DISCRIMINATION BECAUSE OF RACE, COLOR, RELIGION, SEX, OR NATIONAL ORIGIN

SEC. 703. (a) It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer–

(1) to fail or refuse to hire or to discharge any individual, or otherwise to discriminate against any individual with respect to his compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin; or

(2) to limit, segregate, or classify his employees in any way which would deprive or tend to deprive any individual of employment opportunities or otherwise adversely affect his status as an employee, because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.

(b) It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employment agency to fail or refuse to refer for employment, or otherwise to discriminate against, any individual because of his race, color, religion, sex, or national origin, or to classify or refer for employment any individual on the basis of his race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.

With the obvious appearance of gender feminists lurking so near Palin’s candidacy, Stalinist feminism seems to be alive and well in the “anti-evil-empire” party of Ronald Reagan. It’s pretty sad when we see a Republican platform cozy up to lies about the unfairness of women (as a group) taking home less money than men, with no mention of the fact that they (as a group) are not performing the same work as men, or even comparable work.

The commies, socialists, gender feminists and Democrats like to say women (as a group) perform a lot of work that is comparable to work men do, but they are lying, lying, lying, lying. Sitting at a desk typing is not comparable to doing heavy pipe fitting work. If Gov. If Palin is so familiar with the oil industry in her state, that pumps so much oil through pipes to the “lower 48,” she should know that.

Women (as a group) take home less because they work less, and/or don’t work as hard, and/or don’t work as long, and/or don’t have the same years experience as men, etc. Women (as a group) take home less because they don’t perform the work necessary to earn more. This has all been clearly documented in a book by Dr. Warren Farrell, entitled, “Why Men Earn More: The Startling Truth Behind the Pay Gap — and What Women Can Do About It,” This has also been extensively documented by the Independent Women’s Forum in numerous papers that have been published on their site and by affiliates of the IWF who have authored books, “Women’s Figures: An Illustrated Guide to the Economic Progress of Women in America,” by Diana Furchtgott-Roth and Christine Stolba and “The Feminist Dilemma: When Success Is Not Enough,” by Diana Furchtgott-Roth and Christine Stolba. Nancy Pfotenhauer, former President of the IWF, is now a top adviser in the McCain/Palin campaign so I am left to wonder, “Where’s the disconnect between Palin’s speech and the wage-gap-myth facts?”

All that being said, there are plenty of women who make the same as a man would make doing the same job, because they “earn” it. Take Gov. Palin for example, Gov. of Alaska. She is getting the very same money a man would get in that job and many have said she’s doing a better job than her male predecessors. She’s apparently “earning” her pay. I would suggest that the rest of the whining female gender, complaining about unequal pay, stop whining and lying and do the same. How about starting with jobs like plumber, roofer, concrete worker, etc.? Those are jobs where women typically haven’t performed as well as men. And while we’re at it, how about front line, ground combat (grunt) duty, that President Bush has made women exempt from? Why don’t all women who demand the same pay men earn, actually exhibit all the same job performance, then get the same money and shut the hell up?

As a man I am reconsidering my vote for the McCain/Palin ticket in light of Governor Palin’s less than fully truthful comments about the money American men and women earn in the workplace Unfortunately, my preference (my vote) for the Presidential ticket will have to be decided, based on which political party bashes men less.

Curiously, Palin, and all other 2008 candidates for elected office, have failed to mention the “gender-spending-gap,” wherein women:

• # control 88 percent of all purchases,
• # handle 75 percent of family finances,
• # comprise 43 percent of those with assets over $500,000,
• # influence two out of every three of the 3 trillion dollars spent in the U.S. each year!

“Pocketbook Power: How to Reach the Hearts and Minds of Today’s Most Coveted Consumer – Women,” by Bernice Kanner

If women are so unequally and unfairly paid in the workplace, one is left to ponder at length, “Where, oh where, and how, do women earn all the money they spend?”