Gender Pay Gap And Gender Inequality

The gender wage gap in America is a social problem that has existed since women entered the workforce. According to the National Committee on Pay Equity, for every dollar earned by a man, a woman made 78.3 cents in 2013 (Leon-Guerrero, 2016). Data from 1983 to 1998 and concluded that women workers in their prime earning years make 38% of what men make. During the 15-year period, an average prime-age working woman earned only $273,592 compared with $722,693 earned by the average working man in 1999 (Leon-Guerrero, 2016). The wage gap affects women of color in a more profound way that it does non-hispanic white women. Hispanic women are making 53%, African American women are making 64%, and Asian American women are making 87% of white men’s earnings each year (AAUW, 2013).

The average woman in the United States makes approximately $82.90 for every dollar their male counterparts make. (Elsesser). While those 20 cents may seem inconsequential to you, they add up. Losing that much money all year can be the difference between someone living in poverty, and someone living a nice life. The gender pay gap is the cause of this problem. Around the world, women are losing money just because of what gender they are. The gender wage gap is a huge problem, that can only be solved by going to extreme measures, such as requiring people to release their employees wage gap and passing new laws.

Simultaneously, the gender pay gap has financial effects not just on the women, yet their families too. Studies have shown that American families with children count on a women’s earnings as a massive part of their family’s income, and many are the head of the household. Data demonstrates that “seventy percent of mothers with children under 18 participate in the labor force, with over 75 percent employed full-time. Mothers are the primary or sole earners for 40 percent of households with children under 18 today, compared with 11 percent in 1960. Women’s participation in the U.S. labor force has climbed since WWII: from 32.7 percent in 1948 to 56.8 percent in 2016” (Dewolf). Now women make up more than half of the U.S. workforce, the gap in earning deciphers to $7968 per year in median earnings for a high school graduate, $11,616 for a college graduate, and $19,360 for a professional school graduate. By and large, this gap effects hundreds of millions of women and their families, and lag them back hundreds of thousands of dollars throughout their life.

After years of Civil Rights Movements and Pay Equity Acts, as of 2014, women still only make 79 cents to a man 's every dollar. Although the wage gap has shrunk since the 1970’s, progress has recently stalled and chances of it vanishing on its own is unlikely. The gains that American women have made towards labor market experience and skills is tremendous. In fact, women account for 47% of labor workforce and 49.3% of American jobs. But despite of women’s strides, a gender pay gap still exists. Experts suggest that it will take 100 years to close the gap at the rate employers and legislators are working to create solutions. But by allowing women to work in higher paying positions and by proposing and updating pay equity laws, the gender gap can finally be diminished.

The gender pay gap is the difference in pay earned by men and the pay earned by women.( Pay Equity Commission, 2012). There are various ways in measuring the pay gap between genders, such as full- time or full- year wage. Statistics Canada data ( 2012) displayed that the gender pay gap in Ontario was 26% for full- time and full- year employments, which means for every C$1 earned by a man, a woman earned 74 cents( Pay Equity Commission,2012).The pay gap has been narrowing slowly over time compared to the how it was in 1987, which was 36%. However the gender wage gap is still a problem that exists in the society. I will discuss about the feminist theory and how it can be interpreted in the gender pay gap of our society, especially in regards to celebrities.

The gender pay gap is the difference between male and female earnings averaged in percentages. This difference in pay due to gender seems like it would be an obsolete practice in the twenty-first century, but it is real and is affecting millions of women and households in the country. In 2014, women working full time in the United States were paid 79 percent on average of what men were being paid, which is a gap of approximately 21 percent. This means that in the United States, females earned 94 cents on average to every dollar earned by males. According to one study by the Department of Labor’s Chief Economist, a typical 25-year-old woman working full time would earn $5,000 less over the course of her working career than a typical 25-year old man working in the same career. The reason why this pay gap exists does expand into other factors such as education, experience, the work being performed, qualifications, age, and ethnicity which are taken into account. The studies being conducted on the pay gap has economists verifying that discrimination is the best overall explanation and factor of the difference in pay between males and females.

The gender pay gap effects women in almost all fields of work and in all racial or ethnic

Today, the working industry has made substantial progress towards gender equality pay while adding numerous career opportunities for woman in the workforce. However, society still poses ethical concerns between women and men regarding gender pay gap and discrimination for the same job function that apparently still exist. To put it differently, women regrettably have struggled as they continue in trying to make headway in gaining the respect of the working-class industry since the mid-1900’s. In some cases, researchers state that women in the workforce will not get paid equally for the same job function because of discrimination of gender gap. According to one research study, “there is still a gender pay gap. Women continue to earn considerably less than men on average” (Blau & Kahn, 2007, p. 8). While men have the higher ground of work tenure there should be equal pay for women with the same qualifications; I will argue the concerns of gender gap pay while using the utilitarian theory, deontological theory and the objection of moral reasoning to prove the ethical theory.

The reason why I have composed this informative essay on the chosen topic gender inequality: the pay gap is because I thought it’s an important topic to be explored and it ties into economic inequality. With my revisions, I focused on clarifying certain information I put into my essay from other sources so that women could have better explanations on how this information supports the overall paper. I attempted to cover three core areas that may be contributing to the pay gap in hopes that this would guide their attention on the most critical information. I did confuse some students with where I was going with my essay and the issue at hand. Some peers assumed I was informing them on the existence of the pay gap rather than my intended

What is gender pay gap? The gender pay gap is defined as the difference between women and men’s full time average yearly wages. The following equation will provide your with the pay gap expressed as a percentage: Men’s earnings minus women’s earning divided by men’s earning. (Example: 36000-12000= 24000/36000=.67 or 67%). Sadly, women earn 78 to 79 cents on every dollar that men earn in the same exact positions. This is known as the uncontrolled pay gap. The uncontrolled pay gap can be calculated by comparing the average earnings of all working men to all working women. The controlled pay gap is calculated by comparing same type of position with both men and women.

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

Throughout the United States, the wage gap varies, likely due to increases and decreases in sexism throughout different regions. Women earn an average of as much as ninety percent of a male’s wages in the District of Columbia and as low as sixtyfive percent in Louisiana. Additionally, the gap increases based on the minority of races, bringing in the racism factor. Latina women earn the least compared to caucasian males at fifty four percent and Asian Americans at the highest with ninety percent (Hill). The gap also varies based on the career field the individuals are working in.

The pay gap affects women from all backgrounds at all ages and all levels of educational achievement, although earnings and the gap vary depending on a womans individual situation. Hispanic and latino, african american and others have lower median annual earning compared with non hispanic white and asian american womens. But within racial/ethnic groups, African American and Hispanic women experienced a smaller gender pay gap compared with men in the same group than did non-Hispanic white and Asian American

It is important to address the systemic inequalities of the gender pay gap. To do this, this essay will use Bacchi (2006) approach to analyse the text “Speech to HRINZ: The reasons for the Gender Pay Gap” by MP Paula Bennett. This essay will illustrate the theoretical perspective of liberal feminism to show the understanding of the problem, and the solutions of the gender pay gap. This essay will also look at two other theoretical perspectives, social democratic, and anti-racism and discuss their viewpoints and solutions towards the problem.

After analyzing the history of the gender wage gap, the paper will now look at the current state of the issue. The percentage of female earnings compared to male earnings increased from around 60 percent in 1980 to 77 percent in 2010, according to National Compensation Survey conducted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (Blau and Kahn 2000). The gap was larger for African-American and Hispanic women, who earned only 70% and 61% respectively of what white men earned. As a result, April 20, 2011 was known as Equal Pay Day, which is the approximate day the average female employee would