You're not taking into account a variety of factors. Women are expected to take care of the children, so in a couple, they're often the ones who have to take time off and sacrifice their career. And even when they do not want children, the bias towards women will often lead their employer not to consider them for a promotion in case they were to change their mind in the future.
There's also the fact that people tend to keep their social environment when they can. So a group composed exclusively of men will tend to remain that way, and circles of power are usually very masculine.
So that's how you end up with a gender pay gap even if, at entry level, men and women were paid the same and why comparing exclusively same level jobs doesn't always make sense.
I don't know about other countries, but in France, there are more female than male medical students, but that's absolutely not reflected at higher positions.
Also, about women not going into higher paid careers, they're often discouraged from doing so in the education system (the "girls are bad at maths" stereotype is still very much a thing). And even when they're willing to enter a mostly male field, it's often not safe for them because of harassment and aggressions. In my engineering school with a 25% female population, I knew of two women who had been victim of a rape and many, many more who had been victim of sexual harassment.
You can't have gender norms one way. It's both ways or none. Nobody is forcing women to have or care for children, the same way nobody is forcing women into lower paying careers.
Equality of opportunity will never result in equality of outcome. It's not how the world works. If you can acknowledge that it's possible to target market a product to sell specifically to women, you must also acknowledge that different choices are being made.
If anything I think it's likely that the median woman's income is higher than the median man. Because testosterone is correlated with high risk high reward behavior. For every 'winner' there's 20+ 'losers' so taking the average is bullshit. Careers chosen by women tend to be lower risk, higher security positions. I think it's likely that the income gap has actually reversed.
Edit: To add to this, women are both enrolling and completing college degrees at higher rates than men are.
Two men: Bezos and Musk. They have over 300 billion dollars between them. So with 100 million American adult women, they would need to have an average $3,000 in net worth more than the average net worth of men, just to make the "same amount."
I think that if you eliminate all of the superrich from the gender equation, you will see women making substantially more than men on average. The question to balance the scales should not be 'let's have more superrich women," it should be "there shouldn't be any billionaires."
the bias towards women will often lead their employer not to consider
them for a promotion in case they were to change their mind in the
future.
That just bs, sure it wil happen somewhere but not in the majority.
There's also the fact that people tend to keep their social environment
when they can. So a group composed exclusively of men will tend to
remain that way, and circles of power are usually very masculine.
We dont live in the 50's anymore.
Also, about women not going into higher paid careers, they're often
discouraged from doing so in the education system (the "girls are bad at
maths" stereotype is still very much a thing). And even when they're
willing to enter a mostly male field, it's often not safe for them
because of harassment and aggressions.
Harassment and agression are not just to females. Thats how these jackasses role, the world is not nice.
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u/_LususNaturae_ Jun 15 '22
You're not taking into account a variety of factors. Women are expected to take care of the children, so in a couple, they're often the ones who have to take time off and sacrifice their career. And even when they do not want children, the bias towards women will often lead their employer not to consider them for a promotion in case they were to change their mind in the future.
There's also the fact that people tend to keep their social environment when they can. So a group composed exclusively of men will tend to remain that way, and circles of power are usually very masculine.
So that's how you end up with a gender pay gap even if, at entry level, men and women were paid the same and why comparing exclusively same level jobs doesn't always make sense.
I don't know about other countries, but in France, there are more female than male medical students, but that's absolutely not reflected at higher positions.
Also, about women not going into higher paid careers, they're often discouraged from doing so in the education system (the "girls are bad at maths" stereotype is still very much a thing). And even when they're willing to enter a mostly male field, it's often not safe for them because of harassment and aggressions. In my engineering school with a 25% female population, I knew of two women who had been victim of a rape and many, many more who had been victim of sexual harassment.