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> And, when you control for experience, time off for family, etc., pay disparities in most tech fields almost disappear. Okay, so spoiler alert, I'm grinding a

> And, when you control for experience, time off for family, etc., pay disparities in most tech fields almost disappear. Okay, so spoiler alert, I'm grinding an axe right now. It's completely ridiculous to imply that analysts are not normalizing for hours worked. That's one of the most basic things they do, and you really should provide proof in the form of a study that both published its methodology and has been done in the last 5 years that didn't account for this, setting aside that one clickbait publicity stunt from Glassdoor. People keep citing other studies that "don't do this" and it's not true, or point to the national average and say that extends to knowledge work and that's absurd. "The pay gap" is not simply lockstep salary progression. It was just the most obviously unfair and lowest-hanging fruit. That's only the start of it. The fact that women are often passed over for promotion because industries frown on maternity leave, the fact that harassment leaves women with fewer mentorship opportunities, the fact that many environments treat interviews like hazing, all these things add up to create aforementioned gap. Your quote up at the top is the root of the pay gap. It's your belief that someone who works a reasonable sum of hours but then goes to have a child should be paid less. You believe that someone who takes time off for a reasonable work-life balance or a family emergency should be paid less. That attitude is bad for everyone, but it's especially bad for women in much of western society's current form. And yes, there are still places where women DO get paid less for the same work. That is not done yet. And until it's so rare that it's unheard of, we're going to keep pointing it out.

gshulegaard 10y ago
You can find a more thoughtful post of mine further down the conversation, but I think there are less controls than you would suspect: https://youtu.be/QcDrE5YvqTs https://youtu.be/QcDrE5YvqTs In fact, according to a different video also by Christina Hoff Sommers the 77 cents on the dollar pay gap oft cited is no more than a blanket calculation using Census data.[1] This is seemingly confirmed by the Washington Post.[2] In fact, the Washington Post seems to indicate that the 77 cent figure doesn't correct even for weekly/hourly wage metrics much less hours worked. As a whole I think you might find the Christina Hoff Sommers videos interesting to watch. Although they are "classical liberal"/libertarian leaning right (considering the American Enterprise Institute is a conservative think-tank I am not too surprised by this). But I also wanted to ask some things about your points: > the fact that many environments treat interviews like hazing > someone who works a reasonable sum of hours but then goes to have a child should be paid less > someone who takes time off for a reasonable work-life balance or a family emergency should be paid less These aren't really gender specific so I am struggling to see how they would contribute to a gender pay gap. Perhaps you could elaborate? > The fact that women are often passed over for promotion because industries frown on maternity leave > the fact that harassment leaves women with fewer mentorship opportunities I would be interested to read any sources you have that could give me some insight into these dynamics. These are points I haven't read about before and I wasn't even aware they have been examined to any degree. Personally I tend to be more Libertarian and am very pro-"choice". I don't think being skeptical of the dubious statistics surrounding the gender pay gap makes someone misogynistic or anti-feminist...so I would encourage you to try and keep an open mind before labeling someone so just because they express reservations about the wage gap and the statistics behind it. [1] https://youtu.be/1oqyrflOQFc https://youtu.be/1oqyrflOQFc [2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2014/04/09/president-obamas-persistent-77-cent-claim-on-the-wage-gap-gets-a-new-pinocchio-rating/?utm_term=.37c981dec350 https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2014/04/...
WillPostForFood 10y ago
Can you cite a study that controls for time off, degree type, experience that still shows a large disparity in pay? It's your belief that someone who works a reasonable sum of hours but then goes to have a child should be paid less. The question isn't whether someone who takes time off to raise a child should be paid less, it is whether someone with more overall work experience should be paid more. My wife took 10 years off to raise kids. Is she entitled to the exact same salary as a co-worker who continuously worked for that time, increasing their skills? What about a 5 year gap? 1 year?
- geofft 10y ago
  There's this study https://web.archive.org/web/20131008051216/http://www.consad.com/content/reports/Gender%20Wage%20Gap%20Final%20Report.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20131008051216/http://www.consad... , which Wikipedia summarizes as: > when controllable variables are accounted for, such as job position, total hours worked, number of children, and the frequency at which unpaid leave is taken, in addition to other factors, a United States Department of Labor study, conducted by the CONSAD Research Group, found in 2008 that the gap can be brought down from 23% to between 4.8% and 7.1%. It's not 77 cents on the dollar, but it's still significant. Also, if you want to control for time off and experience, you should also control for the second-order factors of involuntarily taking time off or involuntarily having lower-quality experience. If you leave a company because of harassment and don't immediately find a new job, you'll have a gap on your resume that probably translates to lower long-term salary. If you don't get the job out of college you're qualified for because of bias in the hiring process, you'll be a little bit behind in your whole career. If women are making 77 cents on the dollar because they're more likely to be rejected from higher-paying jobs but making the same as men in lower-paying jobs, or because the glass ceiling is keeping them out of the C-suite but wages are the same if you exclude the C-suite, or whatever, that's still a problem worth fixing! The ways in which you'd fix it are different, so it's important to get this data, but there's still something to fix. This blog post from the Department of Labor has a bunch of links to other research: https://blog.dol.gov/2012/06/07/myth-busting-the-pay-gap https://blog.dol.gov/2012/06/07/myth-busting-the-pay-gap
- KirinDave 10y ago
gareim 10y ago
Making paternity leave widely accepted would help fix one of these issues. More people need to talk about this.
- KirinDave 10y ago
  Yes, that is true. It's worth noting that it's a relatively small part of the problem here. We need to stop being angry at women for being women (e.g., viewing nursing rooms as a luxury or somehow unfair).

gshulegaard 10y ago

You can find a more thoughtful post of mine further down the conversation, but I think there are less controls than you would suspect: https://youtu.be/QcDrE5YvqTs https://youtu.be/QcDrE5YvqTs In fact, according to a different video also by Christina Hoff Sommers the 77 cents on the dollar pay gap oft cited is no more than a blanket calculation using Census data.[1] This is seemingly confirmed by the Washington Post.[2] In fact, the Washington Post seems to indicate that the 77 cent figure doesn't correct even for weekly/hourly wage metrics much less hours worked. As a whole I think you might find the Christina Hoff Sommers videos interesting to watch. Although they are "classical liberal"/libertarian leaning right (considering the American Enterprise Institute is a conservative think-tank I am not too surprised by this). But I also wanted to ask some things about your points: > the fact that many environments treat interviews like hazing > someone who works a reasonable sum of hours but then goes to have a child should be paid less > someone who takes time off for a reasonable work-life balance or a family emergency should be paid less These aren't really gender specific so I am struggling to see how they would contribute to a gender pay gap. Perhaps you could elaborate? > The fact that women are often passed over for promotion because industries frown on maternity leave > the fact that harassment leaves women with fewer mentorship opportunities I would be interested to read any sources you have that could give me some insight into these dynamics. These are points I haven't read about before and I wasn't even aware they have been examined to any degree. Personally I tend to be more Libertarian and am very pro-"choice". I don't think being skeptical of the dubious statistics surrounding the gender pay gap makes someone misogynistic or anti-feminist...so I would encourage you to try and keep an open mind before labeling someone so just because they express reservations about the wage gap and the statistics behind it. [1] https://youtu.be/1oqyrflOQFc https://youtu.be/1oqyrflOQFc [2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2014/04/09/president-obamas-persistent-77-cent-claim-on-the-wage-gap-gets-a-new-pinocchio-rating/?utm_term=.37c981dec350 https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2014/04/...

WillPostForFood 10y ago

Can you cite a study that controls for time off, degree type, experience that still shows a large disparity in pay? It's your belief that someone who works a reasonable sum of hours but then goes to have a child should be paid less. The question isn't whether someone who takes time off to raise a child should be paid less, it is whether someone with more overall work experience should be paid more. My wife took 10 years off to raise kids. Is she entitled to the exact same salary as a co-worker who continuously worked for that time, increasing their skills? What about a 5 year gap? 1 year?

geofft 10y ago
There's this study https://web.archive.org/web/20131008051216/http://www.consad.com/content/reports/Gender%20Wage%20Gap%20Final%20Report.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20131008051216/http://www.consad... , which Wikipedia summarizes as: > when controllable variables are accounted for, such as job position, total hours worked, number of children, and the frequency at which unpaid leave is taken, in addition to other factors, a United States Department of Labor study, conducted by the CONSAD Research Group, found in 2008 that the gap can be brought down from 23% to between 4.8% and 7.1%. It's not 77 cents on the dollar, but it's still significant. Also, if you want to control for time off and experience, you should also control for the second-order factors of involuntarily taking time off or involuntarily having lower-quality experience. If you leave a company because of harassment and don't immediately find a new job, you'll have a gap on your resume that probably translates to lower long-term salary. If you don't get the job out of college you're qualified for because of bias in the hiring process, you'll be a little bit behind in your whole career. If women are making 77 cents on the dollar because they're more likely to be rejected from higher-paying jobs but making the same as men in lower-paying jobs, or because the glass ceiling is keeping them out of the C-suite but wages are the same if you exclude the C-suite, or whatever, that's still a problem worth fixing! The ways in which you'd fix it are different, so it's important to get this data, but there's still something to fix. This blog post from the Department of Labor has a bunch of links to other research: https://blog.dol.gov/2012/06/07/myth-busting-the-pay-gap https://blog.dol.gov/2012/06/07/myth-busting-the-pay-gap
KirinDave 10y ago

gareim 10y ago

Making paternity leave widely accepted would help fix one of these issues. More people need to talk about this.

KirinDave 10y ago
Yes, that is true. It's worth noting that it's a relatively small part of the problem here. We need to stop being angry at women for being women (e.g., viewing nursing rooms as a luxury or somehow unfair).