Conservative commentators have recently sounded the call that the pay gap between men and women has nothing to do with discrimination but everything to do with "individual choice." Brad Peck argued that point on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's blog a few weeks ago, and today Christina Hoff Sommers from the American Enterprise Institute does too. She's arguing against the slim potential for the Senate to take up the paycheck fairness bill before the election.
But that wage gap isn't necessarily the result of discrimination. On the contrary, there are lots of other reasons men might earn more than women, including differences in education, experience and job tenure.
When these factors are taken into account the gap narrows considerably — in some studies, to the point of vanishing. A recent survey found that young, childless, single urban women earn 8 percent more than their male counterparts, mostly because more of them earn college degrees.
This argument, that women are simply choosing to leave the workforce to take care of their children, is ridiculous. Sommers dismisses the social influence on women by calling it "1970s-style gender-war feminism" but doesn't seem to understand that we're fighting the same prejudices as we were 40 years ago. Women who see their counterparts earn less money in the workplace after they have children might rationally choose to leave their jobs to take care of their own children because it's the best option for their family; that doesn't mean that large-scale discrimination against women and mothers didn't lead to that decision. Sommers rightly notes that much of the gender gap is, in fact, a motherhood gap -- a recent study showed that childless women in urban areas actually earn more than men. But as far as I know, no study has shown a difference in pay between men who have children and those who don't. Men don't take off work, and don't often take a break in their careers, when they choose to start a family. That is evidence of continued difference in the way we perceive gender and its role in society, and the fact that women might feel subtle pressure to perform gender in a way that looks like choice doesn't mean discrimination isn't there.
Sommers argues that employers shouldn't be held accountable for this type of discrimination, anyway. What the bill does is prevent the kinds of arguments employers often made when they paid women less than their male counterparts with the same job: for example, if a woman gets a new job but her previous salary was lower than what her new company pays, the company can't justify paying her less because she made less before. It also makes it easier for men and women to talk about their wages in the workplace, and easier for women to see how their wages compare. If all of this is a result of individual choice, then there's no argument against arming women with that knowledge, is there?
-- Monica Potts
