Date: Thu, 04 Apr 2002 01:22:19 -0500
From: Ted White <tedwhite at compusnet.com>
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: equal pay
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>

ronkean at juno.com wrote:

> [...]
>
> I don't see the U.S. as being chock full of employers scheming to pay
> women workers less than the men, but such an employer would be making a
> bad business decision, in part because it would bad for morale.  As I
> understand economics, wages in a free market tend to be set by the forces
> of supply and demand, and employers who insist on making irrational wage
> offers are working against their own economic success.

You're overlooking a couple of things.  First, there are damned few employers
who don't want to pay the least they can for the work they need.  Second,
when women entered the job market (post WW2), they were seen as "optional"
employees, unlike their husbands who were seen as "breadwinners," and they
were paid less in consequence (for exact same jobs, performed at least as
well as men).  This pay gap was originally enormous (women got 60% of what
men got) and has only slowly narrowed over time (and as the original concept
of "optional" employment became increasingly irrelevant).   Thus there
exists, in the minds of many employers, a "tradition" of valuing and paying
women less.  And a resistance to paying them more.

It runs akin to the notion that women are best employed in menial, scut-work
positions.  Thus, when my third wife, Lynda, was promoted from word-processor
(read: secretary) to project manager, in recognition of the fact that she was
a statistical expert, and she was responsible for bringing in over one third
of her firm's total billing, she was *still* asked by the company
president/owner to type his letters for him, or to make travel arrangements
for him.  I'm sure most of the women on this list could cite similar
experiences.

--Ted White