Ged Kearney
by GED KEARNEY
When anyone asked my daughters what they wanted to be when they grew up I would always tell them to answer by saying ‘to be paid the same as a man’.
Most people would in turn respond with a furrowed brow.
The gender pay gap was a rarely acknowledged problem 10 or 20 years ago and even now, while each year we have Equal Pay Day as a way to highlight the fact that the gap remains, not much has changed.
If it had, the day wouldn’t exist and I wouldn’t be writing this.
The gap remains a persistently wide 17.5%, despite the publicity Equal Pay Day gets each year as it highlights the fact that women have to work an extra 64-odd days more than a man every single year to earn the same money.
Yes, that’s right – in 2012, women working full-time earn on average 17.5% less than men who also work full-time.
The figure has widened from the 17.2% it sat on the previous two years, then taking women an extra 63 days to earn what their male counterparts earned.
There’s a myriad of reasons explaining why the gap is getting worse, not better, and why women face restricted access to equal employment and career development opportunities in the workplace, leading to just 12.5% of Top 200 ASX companies with female directors, 3% with CEOs, and 2% with female chairs.
The top explanations include that women still tend to be the primary caregiver in the majority of families. When they take time out of the workforce, the reality is that by the time they return they have skipped a pay increase or two and their male colleagues (who haven’t had a break) have climbed the promotion ladder ahead of them.
Making it worse, women don’t automatically start playing catch up when they get back to work. We know that women balancing work and family are continually overlooked for leadership positions just because they may also dare ask for flexibility in their work day so that they can manage their family’s needs as well as do their job.
There are other reasons for the pay gap – like the fact that women often leave their full time secure jobs after having children so that they can get ‘flexible’ hours via casual work or a part-time job, in lieu of the pay and career paths their previous role offered.
But frankly none of these so-called reasons are good excuses. And focusing on them will not help solve the problem.
As long as we talk only about explanations for the gap, the furrowed brows of confused acceptance will continue and women – no matter how smart, educated, skilled or experienced they are – will continue to have to work an extra two months of the year to bring home the same money as men.
In fact, in some industries, like finance, female workers would have to work for about 16 months to earn what men can in one year.
I am tired of talking about excuses and I want to start creating solutions. The pay gap will only be narrowed through cultural change. And cultural change will only come about through affirmative action which makes people sit up, take notice – and take action.
Over the years there has been much debate within governments and women’s leadership groups about the concept of a quota system, which essentially would ensure companies have a certain number of women in leadership positions. Shock, horror, what a radical concept. Make a company promote a woman?!?! Whatever happened to merit?
That’s the usual response when this topic comes up. How about this – women are no less skilled, capable, qualified or good at their jobs than men; they usually just have to fight a hell of a lot harder to get to the same top rung on the corporate ladder than their male colleagues, so yeah, it’s time we made companies do something about it.
If you think about how much harder it is for a woman to earn the same as a man, they probably deserve to be paid double by the time they do catch them!
Another solution is through legislative reform and I’m pleased that the Government has taken some good steps in the right direction through the Fair Work Act. But it doesn’t go far enough. Thanks to the FWA, women can now request flexible working hours. Great. But an employer can refuse without having to give a reason. And women cannot appeal.
But solutions also need to start with women themselves. Women often talk about feeling invisible in the workplace, about being overlooked for senior roles. They need to be more assertive. Let’s stop complaining and start doing. Simple things like setting up a women’s committee at work, or women’s leadership groups in the community not only empower women, but they motivate and inspire them towards change.
I am truly tired of hearing things like ‘well women can’t expect to have it all’; ‘you can’t take time out of the workforce to have babies and expect to come back to work at the same level,’; or ‘if you want to leave work in time to get home and cook dinner and bathe the kids then you have to expect you won’t be able to climb the corporate ladder too’.
Equal Pay Day always reminds me of something former Victorian Premier Joan Kirner once said to me when I was talking about this issue with her. She was responding to my lament over the fact that too many people still considered affirmative action as too drastic and that it ignored merit.
In her words: “Do you think every man got to where they are based on merit? No, a lot got there because they are part of a boys’ club and it’s expected they will get there.”
As she said: “Women need to fight together too.”
Ged Kearney is the current president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions. She was previously the Federal Secretary of the Australian Nursing Federation, having been a nurse since 1985. Ged will be online and responding to comments and queries through the day.
Have you ever felt ‘invisible’ in the workplace? Do you think men and women have equal opportunities at work?
Comments
128 Comments so far
Well why should women get paid the same. Think about it from my (employer) perspective, why should an employer pay a female more then her male counterpart when he has to give her 6 months off paid when she gives birth.
Over a course of 10 years and roughly 2-3 children from each female, thats a whole heap of money being lost just so women can get paid the same.
I say it is totally right for females to get paid less.
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I respectfully disagree with much of this article. It is illegal for any employer in Australia to discriminate on the basis of an employee’s sex. Men and women must be paid the same rate and must never be discriminated against. This is law, and rightly so. Unless there has been a breach of this law, and you can point to companies that are actively breaching it, then there is no discrimination against women in terms of remuneration. As I have seen no blogger or writer offer evidence to this end, I can only conclude that this so-called “gender pay gap” is a myth.
If a woman chooses to have a child and take time off following the child’s birth, that’s a serious decision she would have to weigh up, considering that taking a year, or two, or five, out of her career may put her at a disadvantage as compared to the other women and men who have continued furthering and developing their career during these five years. This just makes sense from the company’s perspective, and is fair to the other employees, male or female.
That said, the workplace should be a meritocracy, meaning the person who deserves the job gets it. If that’s a man, so be it; if that’s a woman, so be it. Making quotas is sex-based discrimination whichever way you look at it, and is abhorrent in the extreme in an ostensibly egalitarian society like Australia. Indeed, I find your promotion of discrimination quite offensive and a little ironic, given that you have devoted an entire article to overcoming discrimination.
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While I am not personally experiencing a reduced wage due to gender, I am frustrated by those in my offce with children, when I have none.
I understand I should be grateful for those with children – these workers are raising our future society, the doctors and lawyers we will depend on when we get old. I understand it must be a tough gig, working full time and raising children. I am not bitter that I pay higher taxes because you choose to have children (eg. I pay taxes for public schools that I don’t directly benefit from, and I pay taxes for the baby bonus and other payments).
But selfishly speaking, I am at a daily disadvantage, because I don’t have children.
Where are my provisions for work-life balance or flexibility to work from home (as it seems I don’t have a good enough reason)?
Where are my late starts and early finishes due to coordinating transport or it being ‘my turn’ to take a child somewhere?
Where are my sudden exits to attend to any possible family matter that arises (what if a childless friend was admitted to hospital, they would not let me rush off for that)?
Where are my extra leave provisions (carers, family) to stay home when I am needed, or have not slept well the night before because I was minding my sister’s children?
All I seem to do is pick up the slack of those workers who have children (or are trying to get pregnant, going through IVF, or are pregnant and need thrice weekly appointments somewhere).
I am the one with no excuse not to take on the extra work or stay late. My priorities are not as important as yours.
Leslie Lafayette, founder, ChildFree Network: “It’s downright discriminatory for an employer to offer more or better benefits because you have children. Different is one thing. Companies that have a menu of benefits are the companies that are really knowledgeable and humane.”
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I have worked in an office environment both as a worker without children, and now as a worker with a young son. I do work shorter hours than before I had a child and leave the office earlier. But I don’t feel any guilt about that. I have worked for the company for a long time and have put in the hard yards before I had a child. I’m not leaving the office early so I can put my feet up in front of TV or go to the gym – I do it because I have another human being who is wholly reliant on me and who needs to be fed, bathed and put to bed. Unfortunately, generally that is a priority that is going to be more important than a lot (if not most) other priorities people may have.
The downside to that flexibility is that I am definitely on the “mummy track” now at work and don’t get invited out to network with clients and miss out on the more interesting work. That is the way the cookie crumbles and I am OK with that. If I wanted to be on the same track I was before I would have to put my work ahead of my family and I’m not prepared to do that.
BTW if you want to have a better work/life balance you can always seek to work less days. Plenty of workers in my office work 3 or 4 days, even without children.
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Hi Gee Gee, of course you shouldn’t feel guilty! I am sorry I didn’t mean for you to infer anything of the sort from my post. Having a child is probably the most important thing a human being can do.
Thanks for your reply, it is very interesting to see that there are so many sides to the story and I didn’t consider that someone with a child could be left out of some networking opportunities.
Unfortunately in my situation it seems I can’t scale back my hours nor rush out the door for any emergency, unless I have a child.
But for this I do not lay blame on those that have children and take advantage of the (much needed) flexibility offered by employers. I just wanted to raise a point of view that some may have not considered.
Best wishes to you and your family.
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Leiah2006. You raise some valid points, which is why many people believe that true gender equity in the workplace depends on extending flexible working arrangements to all workers, not just those (typically women) who care for children. Anyone who has ever looked after an elderly parent, a disabled sibling or a sick friend also understands the need for flexibility. Indeed, research has demonstrated that employers who extend flexible and part-time arrangements to all staff have better promotional outcomes for women. Not only does this remove the “mommy track” stigma of asking for flexibility, it also reduces the resentment felt by colleagues (such as yourself) who would otherwise be excluded from them. The only proviso I would extend is that there are more external constraints on caregivers than there are for people who want flexibility for purely personal reasons (ie. no one asked parents if the 9 to 3 school schedule was convenient for them), therefore not all requests for flexibility are equal.
You say you do not resent paying taxes for other people’s children, and yet you bring it up. I would ask you consider that you are not an island. Someone paid taxes so that you could be born, raised and educated in a well-functioning society. Someday someone (maybe my kids) will pay taxes so that you receive good health care and elder care when you need it. If you have no children, you may contribute more by working longer hours over your lifespan and paying more tax. Those who take time out of work contribute by raising the next generation of taxpayers. Except at election times, we don’t get much say in how our taxes are spent. Just because I drink bottled water or don’t like a war doesn’t mean I get to opt out of paying taxes to maintain the water supply or deploy our troops overseas.
Finally, there’s always a lot of chatter on topics like this about how it’s a woman’s “choice” to have children, so she should just suck it up and take the consequences in the form of reduced pay and greater likelihood of retiring in poverty. It’s as if we all see having kids as akin to getting a dog, or becoming a surf bum, rather than as a vital part of a functioning society. It is well documented that when fertility rates fall to below replacement levels (2 children per woman) economies suffer (http://bit.ly/O9Q2cq). Many European economies have faced exactly this problem, and addressed it successfully by implementing better supports for mothers: parental leave, subsidised child care, and yes — you guessed it — workplace flexibility.
Having children is a normal part of human existence. There is nothing wrong with opting out of having them. But for those who do, I don’t think it is acceptable to ask one sex alone to bear the financial consequences of replacing our workforce just because our workplaces were designed by and for men who have historically never had to choose between having a family and a career. @mothers_in_co
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“Having children is a normal part of human existence. There is nothing wrong with opting out of having them. But for those who do, I don’t think it is acceptable to ask one sex alone to bear the financial consequences of replacing our workforce…”
Firstly there’s a number of underpinning assumptions in this debate more broadly that should be challenged.
The frequent claim that parents are creating social goods at their own cost — ” to bear the financial consequences of replacing our workforce” — and, to compensate parents, that this must be addressed by private cash transfers to parents is a non-sequitir. The extent to which children are arguably public goods and the cost to parents is, in Australia, addressed by publicly provided services such as education and health services. Education, the removal of illiteracy and health maintenance not only benefits the child who receives the services but also has a large positive external effect for others. To that end, parents in Australia already have significant and fair relief from these costs. I have no argument that such social wealth is of long term benefit to me and to society and I embrace my taxes funding this investment.
I take the position that, for the large part, parenthood is mostly a private good; that is, parenthood is a benefit that is consumed exclusively by parents. As such, the pleasures of parenthood are a consumption choice exercised by parents and should not overburden those who have not made the same choice.
Australians have broadly accepted certain levels of cross-subsidy for the needy. Certainly I support a taxpayer funded welfare safety net for the socially disadvantaged and excluded. However, I feel that , in the last decade, the unstated objectives of the previous and current Australian Governments’ pro-natalist policies have marginalised and stigmatised childless households – particularly childfree Australians – at the expense of providing voter-driven middle-class welfare. Ominously, family favouritism by extension, intervenes in the most private aspect of individuals’ lives because the choice to be a parent and birth control cannot be separated from human sexuality and, in particular, female sexuality.
Family policy, in its various guises, has deliberately seen childless households, no matter how poor, unjustifiably cross-subsidising households with children, no matter how wealthy. This is evident in the declining rates of wealth among childless households *relative* to households with children.
The cost of children is not easily determined and is frequently distorted. A variety of methods and methodologies exist and are used by policy makers and commentators alike. One popular method frames the childless single as the benchmark and calculates the cost based on adding additional persons to the household. Such figures are misleading and creates the implication is that people who do not have children will be “better off” by this amount. This is clearly not correct. Some of the costs attributed to the household with the child would have still been paid (by the parents) regardless such as accommodation. Without the child/children the parent(s) would have had the same accommodation costs. Rent or mortgage is not increased if there are four rather than two people living in a dwelling. Similarly other costs such as rates and some utilities are not always proportional to the number of people in a household. Economy of scale distorts “costs”.
I will acknowledge that determining the “costs” of children has policy utility, for example, to provide a guide on quantum welfare assistance for needy children or to calculate maintenance costs for non custodial parents paying child support. But it is clear that the important conclusion is that there is no unambiguous ‘true dollar cost’ of a child.
Of course, it’s true that childless people don’t bear the (private) costs of children. Equally though, the childless don’t enjoy consuming the benefits of parenthood. A question that should be asked – but never seems to be answered — is whether children not only impose financial costs but also offer benefits in terms of an addition to general well-being of parents. The price people are prepared to pay for fertility treatments showed children were regarded as a ‘very large *net* benefit’. One glaring gap in many assessments about the “costs” of children is an evaluation of the psycho-social benefits that is gained from parenthood. Clearly the pleasures of parenthood are certainly subjective and difficult to measure. This ambiguity has been offered as an excuse to be omitted from cost evaluations probably because for many policy applications it is the standard of living rather than subject happiness that is the more relevant concept. When it is assumed that if the birth of a child is the result of a voluntary choice by the parents, parental well-being is increased by having that child – that is, increased by more than the loss in adult welfare caused by the resulting reduction in adult good expenditures.
While few have succeeded at evaluating the non-financial psycho-social benefits of parenting, it appears many analysts have, contrastingly, managed to be incredibly effective at quantifying the subjectively negative aspects of parenting. The literature supporting higher parenthood “costings” – read, supporting greater tax credit or taxpayer funded cash relief to parents – abounds with negative or pejorative terms such as “motherhood penalty” or, in this case presented above, “financial consequences”. Clearly, when the narrative constructs children as a burden it will naturally allude to a negative impact on those who choose to be parents and a positive impact for those who do not. As such when many speak of the “cost” of children in this way, it then carries with it the implication that it is a cost that is somehow unfairly evaded by the childfree and this perception appears to have played into the gleeful hands of policy commentators who hold views that are antagonistic to the rights to childless Australians based on their own prejudices and the unfound motives of childless Australians.
I am not choosing to speak for Leah2003, but I understand and share her frustration at society’s and policy makers’ stereotypes of feckless hedonist childfree/less enjoying some kind of undeserved benefit – relative to parents – which supports the disingenuous conclusion that, this imagined inequity should be addressed by forcing the childless to make sacrifices in their own lives; increased taxes, picking up the slack in the workplace when parents work “family-friendly” hours, or through imposing a perverse noblesse oblige.
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Yes , I agree their should be more women in the top positions in our work force. That way they can preside over driving down the pay and conditions of workers(female and male) below them. Come down to the blue collar ,I get payed the same as the female truck drivers ,forkies,cleaners, etc where I work.
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I’m surprised this article doesn’t address the pay gap in terms of industry as well, as I’m lead to believe this is a significant factor. Traditionally male orientated jobs are more likely to recieve a greater rate of pay than tradtionally female orientated jobs. While it may sound sexist to describe jobs in such way, more women make up jobs in areas such as nursing, child care and teaching while more men make up jobs in trades etc. While i respect the fact that this is a “choice” if a women finds her calling is to be a nurse, as many do, why should this automatically mean a lesser pay rate than a male who finds we wants to be an electrican? At some point, someone decided that a nurse or a person caring for a child should recieve less than a job traditionally left to a male, the question is why did it just so happen to be that the majority of lower paid industries are dominated by females? And why have we accepted it for so long?
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This is so true. My husband and I trained as radiographers together (with me earning higher marks might I add) I put family ahead of career and now my husband earns more than 50% more than me per hour and I am only offered part time work. Do the maths. It is time for change.
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I have to say, as a female teacher, that I can’t bring myself to care much about the lack of ‘equality’ as it’s put between male and female pay rates.
Whenever the topic comes up I find instances of “look at Billy in the EXACT same job as Sally they work the same hours doing the same job and Billy is paid $90 000 and Sally is paid $70 000″ now THAT would be unfair! If a part time male teacher earned more than a female CEO THAT would be unfair. But women in general society earning less on average? No it just seems like such a flawed argument.
This article just brushes over the fact that women may take time out to have a baby/work part-time due to childcare more than men etc. but these are HUGE and important points.
I look forward to having children one day…I look FORWARD to the break from teaching! I feel lucky to be in the position where that will be expected of me and I don’t have to face the same challenges as a man in being the primary caregiver (simply because the traditional roles have the woman at home but I look forward to this continuing to change) It feels indulgent and lucky!
I don’t want to work 12 hour days and do hard labour all day, I don’t want to be a doctor or lawyer or engineer or whatever the high paid professions are! I want to be a teacher and I do not expect to earn as much as people who work longer/harder than me. In fact my feelings about my pay aren’t affected by what other careers earn, if I am making enough to live and pay bills and enjoy life that is all that matters!
As I said above any woman in the same role as a man earning less I feel for you and I would fight for your right to equal pay. Any woman working less hours due to having children and feeling resentful about your position in the workplace as a result? Well I hope this doesn’t come across as rude but that is an issue to sort out with your partner (if you are lucky enough to have one-single mums/dads you are AMAZING)
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Sadly I have experienced the difficulties discussed. Men I worked with earned more and banded together to get “jobs for the boys”. Luckily I have met some men and women who are genuine and raised my heart from the ground. Because it is disheartening. I work hard, I’m very capable, but some men have treated me as though I am different and less capable because why? I don’t have one appendage? I know some I have worked with have earned more (it, financial industry ), it happens every day. And I loose hope often for true equality.
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I have only read the headline, so excuse my ignorance, but doesn’t earnings depend on hard work, the type of industry and the choices made in life? A woman may earn $2 million by working hard as a doctor because that’s her dream, while a man may make $1 million working at a supermarket, because that’s what career he wants.
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I think you need to compare the hours worked and the actually position before figures can be thrown about. In my profession I think we are equal. I guess it would be unfair for same hrs, same job same experience if the gap was that big.
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Former Teacher don’t get me wrong my comment wasn’t a bitter twisted whinge. As a parent and teacher I absolutely see the benefits of a mix of genders in the primary school setting. I also think corporate settings would also greatly benefit by having more gender diversity and wanted to point out if it is accepted as a reasonable I
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I was a hard working girl in the finance sector, very career driven and had sat on the second top pay tier for my job for some years. Had a baby, returned to the same position part time (job share) and at annual review time was told I had dropped 2 pay tiers as they couldn’t grade me on 2 Key Performance areas based on only 3 days a week. I politely pointed out that if you extrapolated my figures over a full working week I was actually outperforming everyone else in the department.
They refused to budge. “It can’t be done like that.” Why? “All the part timers in Melbourne (Head Office) are reviewed in this manner” Really? Because they’re getting ripped off too.
After a further 3 years of this I finally managed to get through to a (new) boss in Melbourne that this was unfair. Figures were exptrapolated and the remaining 2 KPI’s were assessed and I went back to the level I was pre-baby. For the same bloody job.
And don’t get me started on the amount of training I missed out on (either wasn’t offered or was told I wasn’t permitted to ‘use one of my work days’ to attend…then when I offered to attend in my own time was told that wasn’t permitted either).
It left me jaded about my employer and my industry. I loved that job but I work in a completely different field now.
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Just a thought for your consideration. People generally recoil in horror at the thought of companies requiring a quota of women in executive positions, claiming that women would be getting the jobs based on gender not merit to boost numbers. Disgraceful right? Yet female primary teaching graduates can have HD averages at uni and exemplary prac reports yet are far less likely than males ( regardless of results) to gain permanent work upon graduating. The reason being, men are underrepresented in primary schools (although probably not to the extent that female executives are underrepresented in the corporate world). Yet the general public seem to accept and support this example of filling a gender quota over hiring due to merit. Parents gush about how great it is to have a male teacher. I can assure you the men who became targeted grads aren’t bemoaning the fact that they got the job because of their gender, they get on with the job and make the most of the opportunity. Explain to me please the distinction between these two situations?
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In support of your claim here, when I was teaching in primary school in a very affluent Sydney suburb a permanent job came up. I didn’t even bother applying (I was on a temporary contract) as the principal was only interviewing male applicants as he stated, quite boldly, that they wanted another male teacher in the school.
This does sound unfair on the face of things, but to be honest I really like the idea of encouraging more men to go into teaching, particularly primary school teaching, and as my handle suggests I’ve moved in a different career direction, so it’s by-the-by to me anyway. I don’t know if quotas are the answer, but something needs to be done to address the gender imbalance both in the corporate world and in the service sectors (where the gender imbalance swings the other way).
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The reverse happens all the time in male dominated industries. No explicit quotas, but it’s clear there is a preference for women candidates when they apply. Often the issue – like for male primary school teachers – is simply a lack of qualified applicants so over time you still don’t end up with a gender balance.
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FHB, what are you basing your assertions on, though? As a woman who most certainly works the same long hours as my male colleagues and has frequently commuted long distances for work, I am curious. And though I may not be in the majority, there are societal factors that make it more difficult for women to work long hours and take up the opportunities that men do if they want to have families. I look at the directors at my firm, who have all worked hard to get to where they are, but they have wives behind them to organise their home lives. They have made sacrifices in terms of family time, etc, yes – however, often men don’t have to make the same choices between family and career as women do because much of the hard work at home is done for them.
I’m not sure I’ll have the option of a partner to stay home and manage things for me when my time comes, but that says nothing about my willingness to accept risk or work hard. I’m not saying you’re wrong, full stop, but I think some women’s unwillingness to do what you’ve described stems from societal factors as well. If our society prompted a more equal distribution of responsibilities between men and women, it would be easier for women to take on more responsibility at work.
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I think a big part of the solution will be ‘attracting’ men into primary caregiver roles. Surely there are plenty of men who would actually prefer to be the stay at home parent?
At least then the disadvantages of staying home for some tie and then looking for flexible work would be equally shared between men and women.
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Oops, sorry, that just repeated what many other commenters said better below!
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My concern with quotas is the comments they will attract for the women promoted into the director roles, such as ‘she only got the job because she was a woman’. Do you think it will negatively impact those women and others pursuing roles like that?
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I think part of the problem (putting the enormous issue of child-rearing aside) is the jobs we choose as men and as women. Take trades for example – by and large, men tend to choose jobs which are in demand and the capacity for earning is high, eg electricians, plumbers, concreters, mechanics etc. Technical trades where their earning capacity is huge. The mining boom alone makes these trades enormously lucrative. Of course, women are free to pursue these careers but the majority won’t.
Women tend (generalising again) to choose trades such as hairdressing, child care, beauty therapy, aged care, cleaning etc. No coincidence that these are all caring/nurturing jobs, and again no coincidence that they are all incredibly low-paying. And, of course, men can (and sometimes do) choose this type of job, but these fields are female-dominated.
Even in retail, the male-dominated retail areas such as cars, electronics etc tend to be higher-paying with the opportunities for larger bonuses. You don’t need to be smart to see that female-dominated retail jobs don’t come with the same conditions.
I’m giving examples at the lower end of the socio-economic scale, but I do think it’s something that should be considered in the discussion. Why do men gravitate towards “building/productive” trades and women gravitate towards “caring” trades? The obvious end point of this is that the male-dominated trades are far more productive and hence more profitable! But, I mean, you can’t turn this up on its head. Short of government subsidisation, there isn’t really a way to make caring careers more profitable.
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Since when was a “caring job” an unproductive one? Without teachers & nurses for example, our entire community would come to a standstill.
Perhaps these jobs are less highly paid because women typically do them, not men. If most hairdressers were men, perhaps it would be a more valued job and a higher paid one.
I think that a lot of the problem lies with the fact that many women don’t like asking for more money. We undervalue our own contribution and don’t expect to be highly rewarded for it.
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Sorry, I used the word “productive” in an unfortunate way. I guess I meant “financially productive” or “economically productive”. Stupid semantics, I feel tongue-tied and can’t get my point across! Despite the great work nurses do (I’m from a family of nurses!), the results produced in that job can’t be compared to, say, someone who works in a nickel refinery and is actively involved in turning $10k worth of nickel ore into $100k of refined nickel. That’s what I mean by productive.
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Yeah but if there were no nurses then we’d have a lot more dead and severely disabled people.
You can’t use production rate as a sole means of valuing a job. There are lots of different types of jobs that society would be unable to function without which do not produce a tangible product.
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There’s no big profits to be made out of nursing and teaching though, it’s for the most part a public service and paid for by the government. You can’t compare it with many trades, especially in mining, which is lucrative. It is a null argument and has nothing to do with gender.
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I had a brilliant lecturer at uni who along with our uni workload taught us about all sorts of things (plus showed us reels of car accidents before every holiday in an effort to get us all back next term). One of these was talking about statistics on pay.
Uni was a long time ago so I can’t remember the exact stats, but she talked about factors influencing pay including about how men only feel they need to be x% confident in their role before they apply for a promotion where as women feel they need to be 2x% confident. She talked about how men will quote a higher figure in a pay negotiation as they are prepared to bargain down, but women will quote a lower figure because they don’t want to be rejected. How men spend a great percentage of the working day networking while women spend that same time actually working. There were a whole heap of negotiating tactics like that. Now of course these are stats so they are generalisations but this was brilliant advice to receive in uni. I know that it has influenced how I have negotiated pay and role rises.
I would love to see this kind of practical how to negotiate a workplace education be more widespread.
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How about women stop moaning and start a movement, hand over your extra childrearing responsibilities to men, stop filling the breaches, go on strike – a Day of Women’s Family Inaction?
How about men stop being so passive and quiet and start insisting that they be allowed to take up their 50% share of childrearing responsibilities rather than just ‘helping’ and, later, 50% of their responsibilities for elder care in their family, and 50% responsibility for their household duties. How about quotas for men? This will definately give the 17.5% statistic a kick in the right direction.
Men must stop being passive and silent, come out, make a noise, start a movement and have a Day of Men’s Family Action, a Day that goes way beyond just one day.
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My daughters are only 6 and 4 and already my ‘lost’ earning are around $200k net plus super. Interestingly their father hasn’t dropped a dollar. And now I am back at work, my income would be lagging behind my (male) peers due to my absence from work on parental leave and now only working part time. And before I am labelled greedy/selfish and it was my choice to have children etc this is just a fact in response to the article. I am happy forsaking this income to spend more time with my children, but the reality is hat it is a massive hit in pay.
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Your daughter will likely not work more than 45 hours per week.
Your daughter will likely not work more than 55 hours per week
Your daughter will likely not work more than 65 hours per week
Your daughter will likely not work more than 75 hours per week
She, because of this will miss out on seniority through experience.
Your daughter will likely not travel more than 30 minutes to work
Your daughter will likely not travel more than 60 minutes to work
Your daughter will likely not travel more than 90 minutes to work
Because of this she will less likely find higher paying jobs at greater distances.
Your daughter will likely not travel away for more than 30 days per year.
Your daughter will likely not travel away for more than 90 days per year
Your daughter will likely not travel away for more than 180 days per year
Because of this she will be viewed as less flexible and thusly earn less and have a reduced chance of promotion.
Your daughter will likely not be the primary bread winner
Because of this she is less likely to chase promotions and higher pay out of necessity.
Your daughter will likely not ask for raises, promotions or chase seniority at the same rate men at her place of employment will.
Your daughter will likely NOT negotiate pay rates at as high a level as male contemporaries and starter salaries.
Your daughter will less likely die at work, be injured at work or contract a disease or life threatening illness at work and will more than likely seek safer employment indoors with lower starting pay.
Your daughter will likely take more toilet breaks than male employees.
Your daughter will likely work less unpaid overtime and offer employers the inherent value of extra market labor
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Hmm, please explain??
“Your daughter will likely take more toilet breaks than male employees.”
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Maybe referring to taking extra breaks due to periods, or the fact it generally takes longer as women have to undress more, or the fact many women experience a weaker bladder after child birth leading them to go to the bathroom more often.
Not that I think toilet breaks should change people’s ability to earn, I mean when you’ve got to go you’ve got to go!
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Agreed FHB … with everything except the bloody toilet break comment!
Pay rates for women are the product of multiple factors inherent in our usual work choices.
Yet somehow I doubt toilet breaks are one of the defining markers of productivity …
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FHB.
What do you think the reason behind your stats are?
I’ve read statistics of this nature too, what they usually also indicate, is that ‘your daughter will have to make all of those decisions (travel less, work less hours et al), because society says your daughter will do well and truly more than her fair share of unpaid work at home – being domestic chores and child rearing.’
The decisions to work closer to home, work shorter hours and travel less are congruent with the demands of being a primary care giver. It’s usually not from lack of desire, but limited choice because it is by far more common for a women to have to forgo career for family.
So your stats actually reinforce the message of this piece. If the family responsibility wasn’t mostly a woman’s, these stats would shift, and more men would all of a sudden have to factor in issues such as – working close to your kids so your they can be picked up in time from school and day care, being close in case of illness or emergency, or not being able to be away from home too long due to after-school sports, appointments etc. Or perhaps just being able to spend more down time with kids rather than travelling. Now, I know there are plenty of dads that do this, but if we are going to rely on stats, as you have, then the flip side of your points are stats strongly indicate that woman do much more of the family and household duties. Your set of stats and this fact go hand in hand.
Thanks
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Nowhere have I read that females are forced to have kids in the western world. It’s choices.
It’s your biology – You have a choice.
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“…than her fair share of unpaid work at home”
This “unpaid work” is a myth for a married (or partnered) mother with kids.
Mothers actually do get paid for doing housework!
While the rest of us have to go out and earn a wage/salary to afford food in one’s belly, clothes on one’s back and a roof over one’s head, the married mother earns these in exchange for her “unpaid” — and untaxed — housework services.
Furthermore, the Family Law Act is cognisant of the non-financial contributions of a non-working spouse when dividing property in a property settlement when the marriage ends. Yeah, sure, it is illiquid capital but I know a hell of a lot of single people who do their dishes, mop floors and cook their dinner but it sure ain’t earning them some equity in real property!
Essentially the married woman has “payment” for her “services” as a child-bearer and homemaker which exchanged for the food and accommodation that the single woman has to earn an income to afford.
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Ok so my original comments must have been considered too harsh so have been removed. I stand by them personally though as what I said in my post I would say to someone in person, anyway.
So to reiterate, this to me is such a generalisation, is this purely opinion or do you have statistics?
I work long hours, have been in the past been the primary breadwinner and have travelled long distances to get to work and spent many days away from home travelling. I know many many women doing the same thing, so where do you get your information? Also what is the point of your info? Are you saying that women deserve less pay and these are the reasons?
As for the toilet comment, what can I say, (obviously not what I said in my last post which was removed) so I will say this, urinary and bowel function have nothing to do with gender, we all have the same receptors in our bladder and bowel. The need to go to the toilet would also depend on fluid and fibre intake etc and have you considered medical reasons for people using the toilet more frequently, such as Ulcerative Colitis? Men have this as well. If you want to talk about pelvic floor, how about men who have had prostate surgery and need to urinate more often or those with benign prostatic hypertrophy, should we be paying them less? Can’t quite believe I am commenting on bladder and bowel habits in a post about equal pay, it is just so irrelevant, I really had to look twice to see if that is really what was said.
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FHB our daughters are also less likely to take ‘golf’ days and long executive lunches and are more likely to eat their lunch at their desk so they can get their work done in half the time of their male collegues so that they CAN leave to do the school run. As mentioned by Fi you are presenting only one side of the statistics.
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Wow, you got me.
As for only presenting one side of the statistics, you are welcome to reply with research of you own, but you didn’t. Golf days?
days and long lunches. Do 99% of the male population take these.
I suppose I could trope out long phone calls at work to friends and your mother?
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FHB, It seems that the “statistics” posted are more generalisations than statistics. Of course not “all” daughters will work/travel long hours etc. But neither will “all” of our sons.
And another generalisation about long phone calls thrown in for good measure.
And whilst having a child is a choice for most women, it is also most often a choice made in partnership with a man. So why can this decision then be used as part of your argument? Giving birth to a child does not automatically make the mother solely responsible for that child.
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Smoking, coffee etc either gender can have extended breaks. I take less time in the loo than most men I know!
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Well, that stuffs me (and my mostly female colleagues). I have had to drive anywhere between 30-70 minutes for work since the early 90s….
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I work in IT, which is a largely non-union based industry with salaries all over the place, I think. How would I know? The range of salary for my job is between $70k and $120k, by giving employers the flexibility to reward good performance are we inadvertantly allowing predjucies against sex to have an impact on salary? Why isn’t the salary of other employees known to other staff in that role?
If I was a teacher in the public system I would know what my colleague earned based on the number of years they’ve been teaching and the position of leadership they may hold. Not to say this is a great system and that it doesn’t have issues, just putting the question out there….
How do I know if I am being discriminated against?
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Hays Salary Guide. Covers most professions. Will give you an average with most job descriptions and years of experience.
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Google Australia salary guide. I found about 5-8 different guides (also in IT). Also contact agencies and ask them the current going rate. They change drastically, I’m looking now and there is a small slump.
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This debate really confuses me. Obviously the award wage is the same for men and women, so we are primarily talking about salaries. A person earning a salary has the same rights, be they make or female, to negotiate their pay. Obviously across different industries there is differing scope to do this, but if an employee is unhappy with their pay they can and should investigate other opportunities or be strident about asking for a rise.
I think it’s simplistic to say men earn more than women and it should be the same. Some industries earn less than others- the scientist curing cancer probably earns less than brad Pitt but his contribution to society is arguably far greater. Again it comes down to what the market is willing to pay for your skills in your industry at the time you are looking for work.
Arguments that suggest quotas or incentives to employ women are baffling. If anything it suggests women are less capable than men, which I strongly disagree with. Clearly the vast difference is in taking time off to raise children or taking maternity leave, and my opinion is that women and men knowingly make this choice. My sister in law earns a lot more than her husband so he stays at home. Other families make different choices. Whatever your choice, be prepared to own it and don’t ask for any compensation because if the life choices you make. We can’t always change the rules, nor should we. I think this debate is supported by statistics that do not imply cause and effect. If women are choosing to stay at home, choosing to lose skills they will need to relearn, choosing to focus on something other than work, then that’s mtheir choice and it’s a two edge sword.
Women can have anything they want, just as men can. But everyone priorities something over something else and that has consequences.
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I politely disagree.
I can’t choose for my husband to be pregnant or give birth or breastfeed.
When the argument is made that women must choose and make priorities, we are still blaming women and making them responsible for a biological reality of childbearing.
In effect, this says because you are a women, and have lady bits, and have the enormous responsibility of gestating human life you deserve to earn less for the same job. I just dont agree with this perspective.
Also, while maternity leave does play a small factor, there is a wealth of research to show its not the sole factor by any means. There is still a gender bias in wages for equal work. For example:
There is also some interesting research I believe by the CPSU regarding public service awards discriminating against women also. The research found that male dominated departments (such as agriculture, defence) had higher pay rates for equal award grades than female dominated departments (such as community services). By doing the exact same job at one department you earn considerably less that at another department simply because you are more likely to be female.
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Perplexed I polite disagree with anyone telling women they must earn less. Having children is a choice most women have and are free to exercise or to not.
They can at any stage decide to not have a child and continue working, they can weigh up their options with full disclosure of their partner and opt for the parenting route.
Either way they have a choice. What you are talking about is socialist readjustment which is Marxism.
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And even if they exercise the choice to have kids, it only needs to be a few months off per child.
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@FHB. I don’t believe I told anyone that women must earn less. I was arguing the opposite in fact.
Let me reiterate.
Firstly, maternity leave and having a child, is not the sole cause of the gender pay gap.
Secondly, if you do consider maternity leave, I still am yet to see a valid argument as to why because women tend to take maternity leave they deserve to earn less for doing a job of equal work and value?
Thirdly, I don’t believe the basic principal of equal pay for equal work regardless of gender is a “socialist readjustment” or “Marxism”. This does not mean all jobs should be paid equally. It just means that if you are doing the same job as another person your gender shouldn’t impact how much you earn.
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All I really have to say is why do women in the same jobs with the same experience earn differing pay?
It’s not gendered, but it’s being made to sound like discrimination, yet there is ZERO proof. None, not one study where the comparative rate of pay between women and men isn’t adjusted subjectively or is the same between women who have taken time out for child raising and other women who advance through experience.
There’s a lot of willful dishonesty, but it aint coming from me.
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I am a family day carer. I can assure you that if this was a traditionally male job that we would not be paid the pittance that we are. I have 2 university degrees, and I feel sick that a plumber’s hourly rate is what I earn in an entire day, although, like so many women, I do the job because I adore it.
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It’s a real shame that child care workers are paid so poorly as they provide such an essential service for the community and really play such a vital role in the lives of so many young children.
I do wonder though if the salaries are what they are because the industry is predominately female or if it’s because people are not willing/able to pay more for child care? As child care salaries increase, fees must also increase which may result in some families no longer being able to justify both parents being involved in paid work. It’s a tough one because the work done in your profession is so important and we as a community are constantly expecting more in terms of education, reporting etc. for little to no more pay….
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That was a nicely worded response, thanks, I appreciate it! I totally agree that parents can’t afford to pay anymore in childcare… that’s how I ended up doing family day care. I think that if it was men doing this that childcare would be entirely government funded and paid similarly to teachers, nurses, police etc. I guess my point is that female professions tend to be very underpaid… And it’s not because of supply and demand. I have a waiting list over a year long, but I can’t possibly charge my parents any more than I do because they can’t afford it.
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But Betty, you could become a plumber. Jobs get paid by the money they generate and the demand. Saying that your job would be better paid if it was male oriented is completely arbitrary. It’s like me saying if I were a female the council would build a footpath outside my street.
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I think these statistics on pay would be best, if evaluated based on a profession by profession basis, with information regarding the number of men and number of women in that particular profession.
Looking at it on the whole probably isn’t a very clear indicator of the pay gap – as women tend to dominate lower paying fields such as nursing.
I’m a solicitor and my boyfriend is about 6 months ahead of me in experience. He earns $25k more than I do, and it makes me MAD.
However, I like to start squarking that it’s because I’m a woman, when in reality, the actual fact is that he works in commercial law, I work in insurance, he made his firm 4 times what I made my firm last year and works way harder than I do.
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Your nursing comparison is not a good one as male nurses are under-represented only in the lower salary grades of nursing. Once you look at nursing management positions it’s a different story.
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Well, it’s pretty easy to compare the salaries of two first year solicitors, and I daresay just as easy to compare the salaries of two first year nurses. It’s not like the survey should be comparing graduate salaries to management salaries!
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I didn’t suggest they should compare graduate salaries to management salaries. Obviously that would be stupid.
Pay gaps exist for a variety of social and structural reasons. Yes, two full-time graduate nurses – one male, one female – will earn the same amount in the public system, overtime excluded. But they are likely to have very different careers and pay outcomes after that for a whole range of reasons including, but not limited to, having children.
My point is that even in a female dominated profession like nursing, male staff are more often mentored into higher positions. As I said, they’re overrepresented when compared against the ratios of male to female staff in the nursing profession. I’d suggest it’s worth having a closer look at why that is so.
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They certainly are under represented in the lower clinical only, levels of nursing. I believe the situations a bit similar in primary school teaching.
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Hi MMTeam – I just had an innocuous comment hoovered up by your spam filter, wld you mind retrieving it if you can?
I think that it might have been sh*tcanned because it was so astonishingly profound.
Thanks.
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Hey Trog
I just went hunting through spam but can’t find you! Any chance you were so distracted by the profound-ness of your comment that it didn’t save properly?
I will get one of the others to have a hunt too, in case I’m just being daft.
Jamila
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Thanks for looking, Jimmy Jams. It was a strangely glitchy transition when I went to save, maybe it got spat out.
The world’s a poorer place….;)
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It is pointless to discuss the issue of how a woman’s earning power is diminished by her decision to prioritize her family over work without discussing the lack of support fathers have when it comes to flexible working hours, or how our society doesn’t view child rearing as real work, and as such not fitting or macho enough for men to do. The burden of child/home care falls on the women by expectation, very often not by her choice.
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Hey mum of two – agree everyone should be entitled to flexibility and that many parts of society doesn’t quite value the caring work as ‘real work’. We need to change that. And good discussions like this one on mamamia is a great way to start the process!
See my earlier comment in response to Siobhan’s post, where I said paid paternity leave for two weeks is a good start, but it doesn’t go far enough.
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I think Ged is looking at this from the wrong end. A large factor (but not all) in the total lifetime pay difference is due to women taking time out of the paid workforce to have children. Rather than trying to compensate for this by artificially increasing the pay for women when they are in the workforce why not make it easier (and encourage a cultural change) for men to take time out of the workforce to look after children too?
For example, have laws requiring flexible work for men who have children as well as women. From personal experience it is much much easier for a woman to arrange flexible working hours than for a man to be allowed to do so.
And introduce parental leave that men are likely to take up rather than now where it targeted at what women want. For example, allow men to have the right to take a years worth of parental leave during a child’s age when most children are no longer breast feeding. Say from ages 1-4. This would both allow men to take on more of the child caring duties and allow women to work longer hours. Also allow parental leave to be shared between parents, rather than having to be taken by the man or the woman – eg both working part time.
If you have less experience or your skills have atrophied a bit while you’re not in paid work it is pretty much inevitable that you will get paid less. Trying to make employers not respond in this manner will be an next to impossible task as well as cause discontent in the workplace.
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Chris you said what i was trying to say by typing on my darn phone, during lunch at my part time job (which I could arrange, while my husband was not allowed the same opportunity)
Thank you!
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Great comment, and great ideas. I heard once (it may be incorrect) that in Canada (I think) the paid maternity leave is given in two lots, one to each parent. For example, 6 months for the mother and 6 months for the father. It encourages both parents to be involved with their kids from early on breaks down the stereotyping of “house husbands”. I believe the system was that if only one parent chose to take this up, then as a family they were giving up 6 months paid leave from the government. I’m sure there are a myriad of issues that can come in to this, but I like the concept.
However, equalising fathers and mothers in stay-at-home parenting isn’t the only solution. Most couples I know who have chosen for the mother to stay at home after the baby was born is due to the fact that she earns less. If this is BEFORE they have children, then pay equity is not a result of women taking time off to have children – it is pre-existing.
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The idea of a portion of parental leave that can only be taken by one parent is a great idea as people would take it up so as not to lose the benefit. Part of the problem is encouraging the culture of men taking a bigger role in childcare and this would help.
Pre-existing pay difference was a factor for my family too, though for us age difference was one factor, as was risk taken early in career. Having the lower income earner take time out to look after the kids makes financial sense but just exacerbates the problem.
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Yes! I would love for my partner to take time to be an at home dad. My uncle took a year to raise his young child and I think it was fantastic for both of them. Equal parental leave (paid) is the way forward.
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I have always earnt more money than my husband and as a result I didn’t think that equal pay was an issue anymore. I have since re-assessed my position on this front after learning that a work colleague who recently married her fiance told me that she was earning less than her husband. They both have the same job title, description and grading in the same company. Both work full time (exactly the same hours as they arrive and leave together) and are held in similar regard within the business. The only difference between the two is that SHE has MORE experience! She has since requested a payrise and our company increased her salary to match her husbands. I honestly didn’t think this sort of thing happened anymore as we are all earning decent six figure salaries, I incorrectly thought that salaries were based on merit alone.
Before I had kids I worked full time, ~50-60 hour weeks and during that period of my career I was granted many opportunities. I always started new positions in the lower ranges of the jobs salary bracket but after gaining some experience and runs on the board I would pro-actively request salary reviews and as a result would end up with a salary in the top range of the bracket. So, I think if men are paid more, it’s generally because they demand it and if we as women demand the same the gap will close.
While I do believe in equal pay for equal work, I don’t believe that we can consider gender pay equality in broader terms as this article does.
I recently returned to work from maternity leave and do not expect that I will be granted the same opportunities or pay as my full time peers (both male and female) as I only work 3 days a week, leave no later than 4.00/4.30pm and frequently take time off to care for sick children. My peers are all slogging it out for 10-12 hours a day, 5 days a week and as a result take on much more responsibility. On top of this I have no intention of returning to work on a full time basis for many years.
Perhaps the question we should be posing is ‘why aren’t more males taking on the role of primary care giver?’
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Great comment.
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We agree that more men should take on the role as primary caregiver. Maybe the new show on Ch 9 last night, House Husbands, will be the inspiration! Like I said in response to an earlier comment, it’s great that paid paternity leave at least helps men spend time with their family for the first two weeks after their baby is born. But we need to balance the scale for men and women at both home and work.
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I’m totally confused by the statistics here.
I think that it is pretty clear the gap will only close if there is a balance in the gender of the primary care giver – if more dad’s stay home and care for the kids, keep the house running, and more mum’s work.
Otherwise women are always going to be behind in experience.
But I don’t think that is the only factor in the pay gap.
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Yes that would be the case, but I really trully belive that many, many women would not go back to work so that their male partner/husband/etc could stay at home to look after the kids. Sometimes I think we women need to own our decisions rather than try to look for blame elsewhere (not that you are blaming anyone, just in general)
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I for one would have been happy for my hubs to be primary caregiver if he’d been able to go part time.
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It would be interesting to see some studies on want women would really prefer to do, if money and childcare restrictions weren’t a factor.
I can’t see myself being a stay at home mother for longer than a year, and I would say about half my friends feel the same way.
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I would love to see quotas for equal representation of gender in lower paid professions such as teaching and nursing. It would reduce the social stigma on men in these fields. It would stop the bottom end of salaried professionals being so female heavy, and it would probably lead to increased pay for these fields. Win, win and win for all.
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As a childless woman I am soooooo sick of this argument.
YES women who have children generally earn less because work is…
no longer their number one priority,
cut their hours,
don’t have the same level of enthusiasm before pre baby, even though I have experienced many women who claim they do.
Take time off and therfor are lower down the career ladder.
Why should I as an employer have to pay a woman the same amount as a man if the woman works 30 hrs and the man works 40 hrs.
Would we be debating this if a woman worked 30 hrs and and another female employee worked 40hrs and expected the same pay packet at the end of the week ?
This argument is so frustrating.
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If only it were that simple. It is important to remember that the gender pay gap of 17.5% is based on both genders working full time. Here is a good point from the National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling – the gender pay gap cost the Australian economy $93 billion each year.
This equates to 8.5% of GDP.
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As a woman this may impact you one day and I’d be interested to see if your attitude changes if you do have children. Interestingly, the number of hours people are required to work for is usually in their contract. If they decide to work over and above this, then so be it.
Is productivity actually taken in to account? It isn’t all about the number of hours you work. As a mum, I know that I have to be out of the office to pick up my children at a certain time. I believe I produce exactly the same amount of work as I did pre-kids, just in less hours. But somehow just because I am not in the office at 7pm, this is not noticed.
This is about equality for ALL woman, those with kids and those without.
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I have experienced the impact having a baby can have on your career first hand. I have had an extension of my maternity leave beyond the 12 months rejected and had my part time days changed for my return. All of of this, I believe is to force my resignation and an extension of the workplace bullying I have experience by my female director since I became pregnant. I’ve considered fighting this, but when speaking to Fair Work Ombudsman, the process is difficult and the legislation isn’t definative about what business reasons are. The business reasons they have given are vague and with my knowledge of the business unnecessary. The fair work legislation is only lip service. For woman to be protected it has to be made easier and their wishy washy definations need to be made clear. I have seen other woman ‘pushed out’ after having a baby, I am not the first and I will not be the last. I am not easily intimidated, but it is all to hard for me.
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Absolutely understand what you are saying there. We hear these stories all the time and that is why we are lobbying the Government hard to fix the right to request flexible work arrangements in the Fair Work Act. You are right; at the moment they only give you the right to ask the question, but employers do not have to seriously consider it and many just pay lip service to the request. I urge you to keep up the fight because unless we are out there saying bosses can’t treat women this way, then it will continue.
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Ged….would it be fair to say that if my daughter works longer hours and is better qualified than my son, that she just might well earn a million bucks more than he, if in the same profession/occupation ?
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Unless of course if you are female tenns player! In the Australian Open they get the same prize money as the men, but get to play less tennis! What does this say to the women? Yes you deserve the same amount of money but you don’t have to do do as much work? I feel this debate is a little like that. Don’t get me wrong, I truly believe in equality, but each individual person’s qualification and experience needs to be taken into consideration, and at the moment, I’m not sure that all these details are.
We need better studies that do the comparison, and we also need to look more deeply into the reasons why women are not more represented on Boards or CEOs. I don’t think it is purely a gender issue.
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The recent Social and Community Sector’s equal pay case did exactly that. Fair Work Australia looked in detail into how we pay workers in the community sector and found they were underpaid by up to 45% based on an outdated cultural undervaluation of work that is based on caring.
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I this world of free choice, we can all choose what career/industry we participate in. the pays are industry specific, and largely driven by the market mechanisms of supply and demand, not some sexist agenda.
Many men also choose to work in comm services, health, teaching etc. Usually these jobs can be found closer to home and have more flexible hours, which often appeals to women more than men.
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That is because caring doesn’t generate a profit.
The best minds of the past couple of decades have not gone into science, or educating. We have created more Bankers and Lawyers because that is where the profit is at…
It ain’t right, but it is real.
BTW, can we reference the study done a few years ago that stated taking a gap year will cost you $xxx compared to someone who doesn’t???
Sounds familiar, maybe we should legislate that too???
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The tennis argument is a little foolish. Only four tournaments a year are 5 sets for men. The rest are 3, just like the women. And if we are talking about tennis as a profession, then it would be remiss to simply count the time on court as work worthy of being awarded a salary. The women train off the court just as hard as men. Just as many hours, just as long in the gym. Look at Sam stosur
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Grrrr iPhone!!
Continued… Look at Sam stout compared to lleyton Hewitt, who can’t spend as long in the gym because of injuries. Sam is clearly in the gym a lot- look at her amazing athletic figure.
But most importantly, the reason women tennis players get paid the same as men is because they get bums on seats. The prize money at grand slams, just like in the real world, is based on market forces. People like to watch the women as much as they watch the men. They sell tickets, they get paid well. Just as in the Sydney international, where women get paid more than the men. It’s just not as simple as how many sets they play- roger rarely plays more than 3 sets a match before the final. If, say, Andy roddick played several long 5 setters, should he get more prize money?
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Let’s say that the two of us earn “X” per hour. We have the same experience therefore we have the equal rate of pay. You work twenty hours each week and I work forty. Sense says that I would take home more money as I have spent more time earning it. You don’t get paid for not being there.
Consider this an update rather than a contradiction of an earlier comment.
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Sure, the fact more women work part time or casual hours than men means they will likely earn less. But these stats quoted on mamamia are based on full time work.
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Okay then. So do you infer that the pay rate for the same job should be the same regardless if one worker is less experienced than the other and regardless of gender ?
Again, please consider this comment an update of a comment made earlier.
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No, the 1 million one clearly is not based on comparing what men and women would earn if they both worked full time hours throughout a lifetime without interuption. At least ackowledge that.
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Yes, it is. The author has very clearly stated that the figures are based ONLY on full time work. How much more clear and repetitive does it need to be?
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But without interruption? What are the stats for women that don’t take a break vs men that don’t take a break. That could settle the argument. Comparing apples and oranges muddies the water.
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Do the math Carley, see my post below. The sensationalist stats quoted on here are not always what they seem.
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Jamila, Bec and all the other fine Mamamia staff, you best be asking Mia for a 17% payrise me thinks. The stats back you up, its a sure thing.
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I think pay should be based on your performance and your performance alone, I have a friend who complains all the time that the men in her workplace get paid more and it’s not fair. But it is because she does the minimum hrs so she can get home to the kids, she needs to run out a lot if her kids are sick or get awards, she takes more time off work during school holidays. Her male counterparts work overtime, weekends, school holidays etc. it’s simple they put more time in so yes they deserve more money.
I understand if you get a male and a female that work exactly the same then yes you deserve equal consideration. But I think that’s rarely the case its not about she’s a female he’s a male it’s about who put in more. I know I would be peeved if someone got the same wage as myself even though I did more and worked more hours.
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Can we also have a story on what percentage of women take high risk (and therefore higher paying) jobs such as in the mines.
Perhaps we can legislate quotas for forcing women into these types of roles too.
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Johnny, you are completely missing the point of this article. It is discussing how men and women in equal positions are not being paid the same salary to do exactly the same job.
My partner and I have had discussions about men being paid more to do high risk jobs. He works in the coal seam gass industry and his point was that the risks taken in that work environment should equate to more pay, and that women are very rarely found to be working in the industry because of the type of work it is not suited to women. Which quite frankly, it’s not.
The issue here is that men and women working EXACTLY THE SAME ROLES and the same industries, with the same qualifications and experience are NOT paid the same. That is the issue.
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Emma, yet there is no proof of this and the only studies I have seen ever offered are missing several key factors unaccounted for and make seriously dubious adjustments of their own subjectivity.
Many women in the EXACT same job earn differing incomes, yet they NEVER study this – Why is that?
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I would really like to know how they calculate the stats. I don’t think they actually ever compare exactly the same job across sexes do they?
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I don’t know how welcome women would be in a labouring or engineering trade position in the mines, given that a good amount of strength is required. I personally know just as many females as males working in the mines (from engineering to truck driving) and I believe the mining companies love female truck drivers because they’re easier on the multi million dollar trucks.
How about we legislate to force men into the caring professions like nursing, child care and primary school teachers? Lower paid, less physically risky perhaps, but I challenge you to confront angry kids/ parents or patients going off their nut at you.
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Can we have a story outlining how many less hours in a lifetime men see their kids as a result of working much longer hours.
No. Didnt think so.
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What a great idea Anon. We do know that, in general, many men pick up more hours at work after their baby is born to compensate for lost income when their partner takes maternity leave. It’s great that paid paternity leave at least helps these guys for the first two weeks after their baby is born, but we have a way to go to balance the scale for both genders.
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I’d love to see that too Anon, and I think most other MMers would also. We dislike inequality wherever we see it.
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I question your maths Ged, for women to earn 1 million less, if the earn 17% less, then you imply the average bloke in australia must earn 5.9 million across his working life. Given an average working life of 40 years, this is $150,000 a year.
Lets not let facts get in the way of a sensationalist headline hey.
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Not sure all these Anons are the same people, but glad we are getting some debate about this issue in any case. The actual figure of $1 million a year comes from the National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling at the University of Canberra and is a well-acknowledged statistic. If only we were being sensationalist in quoting it!
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The 1 million difference would also come about from women doing a lot less paid work hours than men – eg they not only earn 17% less on average per hour, but also spend a lot fewer hours doing paid work.
I also wonder if the 1 million number is skewed up by CEO/Executive type salaries of which most are men. But most men don’t benefit from those exhorbitant salaries.
Also I’d suggest that where the pay difference is due to choices that families make (eg women taking time of work and therefore accumulating less experience, working part time etc) then it is not such a big issue as income and assets accumulated both parties ends up being treated as a family resource, not an individual one. If it all ends in tears and divorce, earning capacity and non paid work contributions are taken into account.
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If people do the same work, then people deserve to be paid the same amount.
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What about experience? My husband has two years experience in his current role, and is paid less than the other men in the same job who have 10-20 years experience. They do the same job.
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I stand corrected. Experience should absolutely attract a higher paypacket.
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No, I don’t think experience should be the sole reasoning for being paid more. A combination of knowledge, skills and experience is better. Where I work, there are people who have been here forever and I don’t think they deserve what they are paid just based on their tenure. These are people who remain as they know how good they have it and would most likely find it very hard to find work elsewhere!! And it is that reason alone that if I do not get a different role in the next 2 years, I am out of here. I do not want to be one of those people who get to comfortable in their job that they no longer add any value and pretty much hate going to work.
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Knowledge and skills make up a big part of experience.
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Knowledge, skills & experience. Or as some might prefer to say….qualifications.
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I feel that in order to clarify my comment I should add, obviously, the person who works for entire year should earn more than the person who works for only part of the year.
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So let me get this straight, despite it being law that equal work gets equal pay, you want eqivalent pay across a life time despite women taking more time off to raise children, refuse work with lots of travel, dangerous and remote jobs.
The only way to create this most manufactured, inconsidered result is to enforce that women are paid more than men for equal work, to make up the gap due to the less time across a lifetime that women (on average) work.
Sick of this one sided, simplistic view of an issue that is mostly explained by issues that have nothing to do with gender bias.
Yep, lets discriminate against men, so women get the same for working less. Yippie.
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No, if you actually read the article and comments, I think it’s quite clear that there are larger social implications and you are being deliberately obtuse.
The tendency for women to be the primary caregiver in families is due to a range of factors, and one of these is that women are frequently already earning less than their male partners before having children. Thus, the lower wages of women leads to further reductions in earning capacity, a cycle of disadvantage that is almost impossible to overcome.
Even in workplaces where the skills and knowledge gained by caring for small children (for example early childhood education) are beneficial to one’s job performance, taking time off work to raise a family adversely affects income (male or female, but usually female).
Until the barriers to shared parenting are removed, women will continue to be economically disadvantaged and men will continue to feel like they cannot choose to be the primary caregiver in their family.
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Perhaps Carly it is you who is being obtuse.
Women in marriages are on average 2.1 years younger than their male partners, who have axiomatically 25 months more experience in the labor market.
Until such a time as women marry men their own age, this may not change either.
How many men do you seriously think get the option to stay at home with the kids?
Women have 100% of the choices in reproduction, no women has to have a child they don’t want to. It’s not up to the market, the government or anyone to cater to people who think they have an inherent right to breed without the inherent right to take 100% responsibility for said choices. Don’t have kids, or choose a a partner who wants to have kids, but don’t ask me as an employer or a taxpayer to pay for it.
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Actually, there are women that have kids purely for their partner/husbands sake that would otherwise remain child free. It doesn’t get talked about a lot, but it exists. No they’re not mandated to, but for the sake of a relationship it happens.
Your comment about experience also assumes that every one enters it at the same age and stays in the one career. Which, we know doesn’t happen.
The only part of your comment I agree with is the lack of work flexibility for men. There should be more. How about you men take this on as a cause?
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Hi Faybian, yes you are right, there are women who have kids because their husbands want them, but they still have THE choice. There are also men who raise kids that are not theirs and they don’t know. Many different situations not proving the rule.
No, not everybody stays in the same career, but men are more likely to stay in the same line of employment than women albeit at different work places, but this again accounts for why men would be paid MORE in the same job for the same work.
I am not interested in workplace flexibility, I own a workplace and the difference between me outsourcing to India and keeping the status quo is only a regulation away. You can’t regulate flexibility if it doesn’t fit the profitability of a company. People have choices
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Flexibility in the workplace is one of the barriers to shared parenting. You have just helped to explain why this will never happen.
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The issue is that people are not getting equal pay for equal work. No one is saying that women who work 20hr/week should be paid the same as men who work 45hr/week, and of course people who take time off to have children, whether they be men or women are going to have a gap in their pay due to this decision, however the decision to take time off work to have a child should not then prevent that person from advancing in their career once they decide to return to the workforce simply because they paused their careers to start a family.
There should be fewer stigmas attached to the male and female roles in the working world. More options need to be given to both men AND women that allow them to have balance in their lives. People should not be discriminated against for their gender, their lifestyle choices or their decision to work in industries that are deemed ‘lower-skilled industries’.
I find it shocking that there is still an ‘Us versus Them’ mentality between the genders. I don’t believe that anyone would want their daughters to be discriminated against in the workforce due to their gender or their life choices and I believe this to be the same for their sons. Why do we still exist in a society that believes in such cut and dry gender roles? Some families need both parents working full-time, why should a female earn less than a man if she is contributing to her family in the same way that her husband is? Some families don’t need both parents working full-time, why shouldn’t it be the father who is allowed to consider flexible working hours without the fear of his career suffering the consequences?
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No ones suggesting that men get discriminated against anon. Women know what it feels like.
Remember the days females had to hand in their resignation after their weddings, or didn’t even get jobs, because “they’d only get married and have kids”. Then there wasn’t childcare like there is today up until the late 70s/early 80s, so women HAD to stay home with their kids up until they went to school.
These days most women expect and are expected to contribute in a meaningful way to the household budget. Better paternity leave would be helpful here, it may decrease the difference in pay earned over a lifetime between the genders.
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and we have all been fooled bvy the 1%. Yes ladies, you want to work.
You want to slave like the men so you can afford to keep a roof over your kid’s head.
Now we have 2 incomes per hoousehold (yes I am being simplistick) and no one has time to do anything. We can’t afford to buy a house, rents are crazy, power is going up and real wages are not keeping pace.
Do we know what happens when we increase the workforce size? We reduce real wages (except at the very top and if we are looking at total averages then this is the main reason for the gap.)
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