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The group 1 group, which wishes to hire more women to "exploit" this gap, doesn't have to engage in wage discrimination though, do they? They just have to hire

The group 1 group, which wishes to hire more women to "exploit" this gap, doesn't have to engage in wage discrimination though, do they? They just have to hire at the "going rate" for women, which to the extent that a wage gap exists means they would be hiring mostly women. If they did hire any men, they just need to ensure they are paid the same as their existing workforce. So you don't need to engage in wage discrimination to hire women, since that is evaluated within a company, not in relation to a sector has a whole. That is, if McDonald's pays all their employees $10 an hour and they are mostly women, and Burger King pays all their employees $15 an hour for approximately the same work and they are mostly men, I don't think there is any (legal) claim for discrimination?

mattnewton 8y ago
No, group 2 must be doing wage discrimination per the definition: they are paying women less solely because of their gender, that’s the only way the arbitrage works. If they set wages at $10/hr hoping to capture all the women turned away, they will also fail to capture male employees worth $15/hr. That puts them in the same pool as Burger King. There isn’t an arbitrage opportunity based on gender here. Assuming that Mcdonald’s and Burger King are the only employers, this also doesn’t get rid of the pricing gap. Women are paid less on average because they are turned away from the higher paying Burger King disproportionately. Burger King thinks what they are doing is not discrimination. Mcdonald’s must also think what they are doing is not discrimination, or they have a vast conspiracy to violate the law. They are both Group 2 companies.
- BeeOnRope 8y ago
  I made everything much more confusing by making a typo in my first sentence. I meant to refer to group 1 (it's corrected now). I agree that group 2 exhibits wage discrimination. It was group 1 one or a variant thereof that I meant to discuss: this group presumably values women equally to men [1], hence wants to exploit the wage gap as the GP suggested by hiring mostly women and hence getting ~30% more for their hiring dollars. You proposed that this group would be knowingly paying women less, therefore acting both unethically (depending on your ethical view of the matter, anyway) and opening themselves up to legal liability. I'm saying that this group can just offer positions close to the lower going rate for women: this would presumably result in them hiring mostly women (and some men due to variance, etc). As long as all hiring and wage decisions are gender-blind however, they would not be discriminating - they are only "passively" taking advantage of the gap via their range of salary offers. --- [1] I.e., to them the wage gap is not logical hence women are being underpaid.
stcredzero 8y ago
They just have to hire at the "going rate" for women, which to the extent that a wage gap exists means they would be hiring mostly women. Not just that. That company would also need to offer more workplace flexibility, if we are to believe the study.

mattnewton 8y ago

No, group 2 must be doing wage discrimination per the definition: they are paying women less solely because of their gender, that’s the only way the arbitrage works. If they set wages at $10/hr hoping to capture all the women turned away, they will also fail to capture male employees worth $15/hr. That puts them in the same pool as Burger King. There isn’t an arbitrage opportunity based on gender here. Assuming that Mcdonald’s and Burger King are the only employers, this also doesn’t get rid of the pricing gap. Women are paid less on average because they are turned away from the higher paying Burger King disproportionately. Burger King thinks what they are doing is not discrimination. Mcdonald’s must also think what they are doing is not discrimination, or they have a vast conspiracy to violate the law. They are both Group 2 companies.

BeeOnRope 8y ago
I made everything much more confusing by making a typo in my first sentence. I meant to refer to group 1 (it's corrected now). I agree that group 2 exhibits wage discrimination. It was group 1 one or a variant thereof that I meant to discuss: this group presumably values women equally to men [1], hence wants to exploit the wage gap as the GP suggested by hiring mostly women and hence getting ~30% more for their hiring dollars. You proposed that this group would be knowingly paying women less, therefore acting both unethically (depending on your ethical view of the matter, anyway) and opening themselves up to legal liability. I'm saying that this group can just offer positions close to the lower going rate for women: this would presumably result in them hiring mostly women (and some men due to variance, etc). As long as all hiring and wage decisions are gender-blind however, they would not be discriminating - they are only "passively" taking advantage of the gap via their range of salary offers. --- [1] I.e., to them the wage gap is not logical hence women are being underpaid.

stcredzero 8y ago

They just have to hire at the "going rate" for women, which to the extent that a wage gap exists means they would be hiring mostly women. Not just that. That company would also need to offer more workplace flexibility, if we are to believe the study.