Gender Income Inequality

In Income Inequality: Too Big to Ignore, Robert H. Frank paints a picture to the reader about the struggles of pier pressure. For example: an upper-classmen chooses to buy a big house and fancy clothing. This acts as a “frame of reference” to the changes and norms of the society. If he spends money on something nice, a middle-classmen will then go and decide to do the same thing, and then a lower-classmen…all the way down the social hierarchy. This is what he calls an “expenditure cascade.” Robert relates this with a person’s downfalls, which can be traced due to lower income inequality. Income inequality basically means that in a given quantity, the dispersion of income is underlined by the gap between individuals and or households with

In American society today there is an imbalance in the gender income gap between men and women in the work force. Many factors such as discrimination, productivity, educational background and disproportional hours worked contribute to this ongoing challenge. While many are skeptical, others remain to have strong beliefs that women and men are treated equally. In most professions according to Glynn “women only earn seventy seven cents for every dollar earned by men” (2014). Although, the seventy seven cents figure does not accurately reflect gender discrimination, it does capture some discrimination,

In any given population, there is a difference between what people within the population earn. The uneven distribution of income in any given population is income inequality. In order for there to be income, there has to be several sources of income. These sources of income may be combinational or independent per person receiving the income. Income may result from wages, rent, bank account interests, salaries or even profits made in business transactions ( Stiglitz, 2012).

Inequality is not favorable in society. There is inequality in many aspects of our society, such as race, and gender. The main inequality we look at is income inequality in the United States. The one percent of the population control a vast majority of the United States currency. The Gini coefficient has been increasing ever since the Industrial Revolution, a period where education, manufacturing, and economics has shown growth. However, income inequality has increased in the Industrial Revolution. There are many events, and causes that have led to the rise of income equality in the United States.

For the past 30 years the “gap” in income received by the rich and the lower class has continuously continued to increase, showing no signs of decrease anytime soon. This gap has mostly affected the middle class, which is made up of mostly African Americans and Hispanics, making America less determined to correct such an issue. Given the circumstances African American’s are the focus of this issue due to the fact they make up majority of the middle class. It is known that modern racism exist within today’s society in various ways, one of which happen to be within the economy. For decades the economy has had its downfalls, however, it’s been facing an issue that it has been hiding from the rest of the nation. The gap that everyone speaks has

In recent years, a growing gap between the wealthy and the middle class has grown, as the wealth of the world has increased significantly, yet only a minority of individuals get to enjoy it. Income inequality has been proven to be detrimental to not only the economy, but to the overall well-being of a nation as it leads to societal upset and can potentially prompt a decline in progression as a nation. Over time, income inequality has led to negative results in the United States, as well as many other nations including Greece. Consequently, the solution to prevent income inequality from deteriorating a nation and prevent economic upset is to ultimately tax those who are wealthier at a higher rate and put said money towards education and healthcare

The American Dream remains alive and well however due to income inequality it has failed to become a reality for the overwhelming majority. The fact that all politicians today still agree that income inequality is a major problem in the United States, shows that there persists an overwhelming need for better methods than the ones that have been tried in the past. Politicians, in their quest to win elections, emphasize the failure of our economic system to bridge and close the gap between the rich and the poor masses. The implantation, by governments, of various economic theories postulated by the great economic minds

Although many people are now bringing up a pay gap between genders, there is something being over looked that proves there isn’t a pay gap, but something else. The Gender Income Gap is a supposed payment gap between men and women, stating that to every man’s dollar a woman only gets payed seventy cents. Statements like theses can grab people’s attention and get them to believe this without much proof of it actually existing. Most people get there information about the gap from surveys over all women and men average pay, this is not a good representation of the topic because it doesn’t go into any detail of actual jobs and difference of pay. There are many other factors that going into the pay gap that would make it into something else not necessarily a pay gap. There are several solutions for this problem most of them aren’t necessarily for equality but for the gain of one sex at the cost of the rights of another. The one I will be talking about later doesn’t need government intervention and doesn’t need for one sex to do more. This solution will come from “changes in the labor market, especially how jobs are structured and remunerated to enhance temporal flexibility.”1

In “Inequality Has Been Going on Forever… but That Doesn’t Mean It’s Inevitable” by David Leonhardt, he responds to the issue of income inequality between the wealthy and the poor. He starts out with explaining that rising income inequality has been going on for so long that it is starting to look inevitable. Leonhardt then states that Thomas Piketty had wrote that income inequality has been a historical norm. Piketty also writes that the inequality has risen all throughout modern history, with some exceptions including wars and depressions. Leonhardt then begins to explain that even though something may seem natural or likely, it doesn’t mean something is inevitable. Leonhardt then states that the course of income inequality can be changed. He tells that along with wars and depressions, education can disrupt income inequality. I agree with David Leonhardt that income inequality is not an inevitability, and it is something that can be changed.

However, it is widely acknowledged that pay inequality has persisted for decades in Australia, as is evidenced by the gender pay gap (Australian Human Rights Commission, n.d.). Over the past three decades the gender pay gap in Australia has fluctuated between 15% and 18%, equating to women earning only 84c for every dollar that a man earns (Pocock et al, 2013:605; Pocock et al, 2013:605; Australian Human Rights Commission, 2014:22). In other words, in order for women to earn the same salary as a man, they would need to work an additional 64 days annually (Australian Human Rights Commission, 2014:32). Furthermore, between 2006 and 2010 Australia fell from 15th to 23rd on the Global Gender Gap, and then again to 24th in 2013 (Noble & Pease, 2011:31; Australian Human Rights Commission, 2014:22). These decreases were the result of the persisting gender pay gap, as in 2010 Australia ranked a low 59th for wage equality (Noble & Pease,

For many years now it has been assumed that men are paid more than women are paid in many occupations in many countries. We often question, why there is a pay gap between men and women especially if they are performing the same job? Economist Francine Blau and Lawrence Kahn took a set of human capital variables such as education, labor market, experience, and race into account and additionally controlled for occupation, industry, and unionism. While the gender wage gap was considerably smaller when all variables were taken into account, a substantial portion of the pay gap remained unexplained. These unexplained gaps are evidence of discrimination, which remains a serious problem for women in the workforce. In a standpoint refusing discrimination,

Gender inequality plays a critical role when it comes to social progress. As a woman,

Income inequality has been a major issue in American history. There are many different factors that contribute to inequality. These include education, wealth, discrimination, ability, and monopoly power.

The effect of women's employment on inequality is not straight forward and depends mostly on patterns of selection into the labor market. Previous research in the US found that wives' employment reduced inequality among families because women's wages complemented the household income and drived family income towards the center of the income distribution. It is clear that in order for the household income inequality to decline, women’s labor force participation should be relatively high (Cancian & Reed, 1999; Nielsen & Alderson, 1997). Albrecht and Albrecht (2007) also reported that increased female employment results in lower levels of inequality, and Western et al. (2008) found that among families with children, women participation has an

Gender-based income gap was thought to be diminished by the education. This article talks about how education improvement among women has also not significantly helped to reduce wage gap. The author shows findings from different surveys. Results shows that still on average, men are paid more than women with equivalent education credentials. Author describes education alone is not factor that can reduce income gap, gender organization of work could be other reason.