Hi everyone, I hope you’re all well.
So, August 28th 2019 is Equal pay day; that is, the day that marks the extra
period of time women allegedly need to work to achieve the same
wages as men.
Now, this is based on the so-called gender pay gap;
the comparison of the amount of money men and women make per year.
In Australia, for example, women earn 86 cents for every man’s
dollar, leaving a pay gap of 14%.
In the USA women earn 79 cents for every man’s dollar,
leaving a pay gap of 21%.
There is a pretty steady stream of commentary from feminists about
how we still live in a terribly sexist society because apparently
women aren’t paid the same as men for equal work.
Only, this commentary is not telling the full story.
See, the gender pay gap is not a comparison of what men and women are
paid for equal work.
It is a comparison of the average earnings, not wages, of men and
women throughout the course of the year.
“Average” is the key word there.
It does not compare like for like roles, and does not take into account factors
like the different industries men and women predominantly work
in.
That is, men tend to work in higher paid industries like mining,
STEM, and business, whereas women are drawn to lower paid industries
like teaching, nursing, and social work.
It also does not consider the fact men on average work more
overtime than women do, or the time women take off to have kids
and the effect that has on their work experience relative to men.
It
also does not consider that women, on average, aren’t as efficient as
men when it comes to negotiating raises and salaries.
For example, the Australian Bureau of Statistics data indicates that
the pay gap is widest in industries where individual wage
negotiations are prevalent.
Women do not have as much testosterone as men, so on average, they are
unfortunately not as aggressive or assertive when negotiating their
value.
In other words, the gender pay gap isn’t determined by gender; it’s
determined, largely, by choices.
Yet despite the fact the gender pay gap has been debunked again and again and
again, this pesky economic myth persists as a core factor of
modern feminist commentary.
Like this video from the cast of Good Trouble
Now, I can’t believe that in 2019, with the truth of the issue easily
accessible, supposedly intelligent and educated women are putting
forward commentary like that.
I mean, what kind of an argument is
Particularly when there has been legislation in pace for decades that
make paying women and men differently for equal work unlawful.
If it were legal for women to be paid less than
men for the same work, nobody would hire men ever, because they could
save anywhere between 15 and 25% in labour costs.
So, I can only conclude that these women, and other feminists who
say similar things, are either stupid, woefully under researched, or,
and I hate to say it, lying.
In this video, I want to clear up all the lies so-called advocates for
women tell about the gender pay gap.
Not because I’m pushing some misogynistic right-wing conspiracy theory,
but because I care about women, and I want them realise they have control
over their own financial destiny.
And if you still don’t believe me, even Australia’s Workplace Gender
Equality Agency says quite clearly that the gender pay gap B ROLL
OVERLAY is the difference between women’s and men’s average
weekly full-time equivalent earnings, expressed as a percentage of
men’s earnings.
It is a measure of women’s overall position in the
paid workforce and does not compare like roles.
So, why do feminists persist in pushing this myth?
Well, feminist leaders rely on having things to complain
about in order to make a living, so they neglect to mention the full
story.
As for their little adherents; they are generally insecure women
who have been roped into this victim identity because they don’t
like the idea of confronting their own shortcomings, and are
therefore happy to blame everything on men or “the system”
The way they justify this to themselves is by linking the idea of
equality with equity.
That is, feminists perceive “equality” as equality
of outcome, not equality of opportunity.
This is because, ultimately, feminists don’t want equality.
They want female supremacy.
Equality of outcome suits this agenda because in order to make
everyone earn the same money without women having to do any
extra work, women need to be afforded special privileges.
So, in an ideal feminist world, while everyone might
look equal, women are being given a leg up at the expense of men,
for no other reason than they’re women.
Does that sound like equality to you?
Australian Labor politician Tanya Plibersek provided a very good
example of this complex with this little speech
What Tanya Plibersek failed to mention was that metal workers work
longer hours than early childcare workers and in far more dangerous
conditions, for example, on oil rigs, building bridges, handling hot
metal, etc.
They also have more expensive out-of-pocket requirements such as vehicles and expensive
tools, and have an infinitely higher risk of getting injured,
dismembered, or, you know, dying on the job.
Considering all of this, I’m sure you can see why an early childcare
worker, male or female, would get paid less than a metal worker.
However, apparently Tanya can’t, because she is a feminist who
believes in equality of outcome, not equality of opportunity.
In her mind, even though a male metal worker works longer, harder,
and with greater risk than a female early childcare worker, he does
not deserve to be paid more than her, because she is a woman, and
therefore should have her salary padded to be ‘equal’ to that of a
man.
Whether she earns it or not.
Side note; I have the utmost respect for anyone who works in
childcare.
I’m not trying to devalue the work they do.
I’m just
relaying the technicalities of the job and the implications they have
on salary.
Just so we clear that up.
So, what happens when you control for these factors affecting the
gender pay gap?
Well, according to a 2016 study by Glassdoor, if you
account for age, education, years of experience, industry and
occupation, company specific and job title specific controls, the pay
gap shrinks dramatically to single digit percentage points.
Further, if we look at a study by Payscale, when mitigating factors
are controlled for, it has the gender pay gap in the USA down to only
2%, meaning that women actually earn 98 cents for every man’s
dollar, not 79 cents.
But what about those remaining single digit percentage points?
According to a recent Australian study put together by KPMG, 39% of
the gender pay gap in Australia is due to discrimination.
That is, the little bit that can’t be explained by controlling
for industry, age, job title, etc.
Needless to say I was very interested in just what this discrimination
entailed.
After all, discrimination is a bit of an umbrella term that can
mean a lot of different things.
So I read the study to see what they meant, because surely, to make an assertion
as dramatic as that, they’d have to back it up with something
concrete, right?
Turns out the closest thing I found to an explanation of this so-called
discrimination were things like “workplace culture” and unconscious
bias and unfair hiring practices, all of which are very subjective terms
and very hard to prove.
They can also be explained in other ways, like personality type.
Again, women have less testosterone than men.
As a result, they may not be as aggressive at putting
themselves forward in the workplace and grabbing the attention of
the higher ups.
It’s likely they’ve worked less overtime on average, which would
certainly put them below anyone for a promotion, male or female,
who works more hours than they do.
Plus, the lack of overtime means they’ll make less money on average.
Jumping straight to the umbrella term of “discrimination” and failing
to give a concrete, tangible example of what that actually is, is just a
lazy way of conveniently pushing the narrative that somehow
women are being held back by society and the system.
Which, given the fact women have access to every right,
privilege, and vocation that men do, by law, is just not the case.
The other thing surveys like the ones by KPMG, Glassdoor, the
WGEA, and PayScale do, is present perfectly legitimate choices made
by women as somehow evidence of great injustice.
For example, they try to bill the fact women and men fall
into different industries as some sort of societal wrong based on pressure
women apparently feel to go into certain industries that are
lower paid.
That’s why they call it “occupational segregation”.
Well, you could hypothesise that a few decades ago, definitely.
But women have received enormous encouragement
for at least a couple of decades now to move into fields
like STEM and politics.
There has been so much “girl power” in the media, schools,
universities, celebrities spewing it left right and centre that it has
pretty much saturated mainstream popular culture.
There is plenty of incentive and encouragement for girls and women
to enter traditionally male dominated fields…but they’re still not
doing it.
And while the gender pay gap as closed a little bit, the fact
that after all these years of fuss about promoting women and getting
them into higher paid industries, the fact they’re still gravitating
towards traditionally female professions could perhaps be indicative
that there is something else going on here.
Either we still live in a society rank with sexism, or, maybe, given our
innate biological and psychological differences to men, women are
just making the choices they want to make based on how they’re
wired.
It’s like the Nordic gender paradox; the more freedom you
give men and women to do whatever they want, the more likely they
are to fall into traditionally male and female gender roles.
Speaking of traditional gender roles; another form of spin feminists
engage in to demonstrate the alleged injustice of the pay gap is to
demonize childrearing, by calling it “unpaid labour” or “unpaid
domestic duties.
As if a woman’s choice to follow her biological instinct and focus on the quite extraordinary
act of bringing another human being into the world is some sort of
domestic slavery that women are forced into.
I think Western society is in a very sorry state if the act of a woman
choosing to prioritise children over a career is characterised as
“unpaid” labour, implying that since it doesn’t have a price tag, it’s
lacking in value.
These studies also tend to twist language to drive their narrative of
discrimination.
For example, the KPMG study cites a survey of 4600
workers across 800 employers using data from the Australian
Workplace Relations Survey, which found there was no difference in
the likelihood of women asking for a raise.
However when they did ask, they were less successful than men in
obtaining one.
KPMG used this as an example of gender discrimination.
But the thing is, asking is very different from negotiating.
And as I stated earlier, men on average tend to be more assertive
at the bargaining table than women are.
Just because someone asks for a raise doesn’t mean they’re going to obtain one just by
asking the question.
All in all, the gender pay gap is an ideologically driven feminist myth,
and it’s grossly harmful to women.
Feminists claim to want to empower women, yet in the same breath insist
that no matter what they do, or how hard they work, they are always
going to be held back by the fact that they are women.
How is that supposed to inspire women to chase their dreams and
live their best lives if they think they’re on the back foot from the
get-go, because of hostile societal forces they can’t control?
I’m not saying sexism in the workplace doesn’t exist.
Yes there are still some chauvinistic dinosaurs out there
who may be contributing to those last single digit percentage points
of the gender pay gap.
But in 2019 they have nowhere near the power they
used to; they’ve either died out, retired, or are tippy toeing
around HR departments.
Also, any tiny percentage of leftover pay discrepancy that maybe
possibly is caused by discrimination is more than balanced out by the
fact that, on average, women pay less tax than men, and take more
out of the welfare system in childcare payments, and also the aged
pension, since women live longer than men.
So, can we please, PLEASE, finally put this silly feminist pay
gap myth to bed?