Education and Gender Discrimination in the Workplace

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Another major problem women encounter in the work place is the wage gap. As discussed in class by Marsan, 2017, The Wage Gap by Gender and Race “it is the major issue that women face.” Women want equal pay for equal jobs. An American survey shows that

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women’s salary is 75% low as men’s. Women who are equally educated and trained and have the same experiences as men are not getting equal pay. This inequality dates back from centuries

where it was believed that since men are the bread winners of the family therefore they should get paid more. A common reason that women are told as to why they make less than is because they don’t negotiate as men. Men are comfortable with negotiating whereas women see it as being needy or asking for too much. Dr. Rae discussed her experience with the wage gap by relating it to a friend who experienced it dramatically. Her friend was a PhD holder who had a job with a book selling company and years of supervisory experience. After she had been working with them for over a year, she found out that a man who was hired the same time they hired her and only had a master’s degree with no supervisory experience, made ten thousand dollars ($10,000) more than she did. After finding out about this, she went to her boss and requested a raise to make the same as the man did. She also made a threat that if she finds out that she was making less than the man because of her gender, she was going to take the case to court. They quickly gave her a raise. She was told that the reason why he made ten thousand dollars ($10,000) more than her was because he negotiated. This is common for women because they didn’t learn that it was okay to say no or to ask for more. They are taught to take what they get.

In the reading, “Paid Labor” (2015), Susan Shaw and Janet Lee stated that the most important legislative gains include the “Equal Pay Act of 1963 which protects men and women who perform substantially equal work in the same establishment from sex-based wage discrimination” (478). Even with the Equal Pay Act, women still experience the wage gap. They also gave an example that “female physicians on the average earn about a third less than male

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physicians.” The wage gap does not only affect women, but it also affects children and families because some women are the sole and co breadwinners of half of the families. Lilly Ledbetter

who worked at the Goodyear tire and Rubber as a supervisor tried to close the wage gap between men and women. In the YouTube video of her equal pay hearing (EdLabor Democrats,2007), Ledbetter worked at the company for 19 years but was paid less than her male colleagues. She was paid $,3727 a month compared to the lowest paid male supervisor who got paid $4286 a month. She stated that she only started having suspicions of the act at the end of her career but there was no way to prove her point because “pay levels were kept strictly confidential.” She later knew the truth when someone anonymously left proof in her mailbox at work showing that she got paid less than 3 of her male colleagues. Ledbetter’s determination for equal pay in the workplace became a victory for all women when former President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act in January,2009. The biggest problem facing our country today is poverty due to families not making enough to live on, so putting an end to the wage gap would help address that problem.

In conclusion from what have been discussed above, women have been through so much from being housewives and properties of men. They fought for the rights to education. They wanted to have careers, financial independence and stability and to be included in bringing income to the family. With them being educated, they still experience discrimination in the workplace because they are known for motherhood, taking care of the family and upkeeping the home. Gender inequality has always been a problem. It still exists, and people suffer the consequences every day, but with education and the world improving every day, we trust in the future of it being stopped.

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Bibliography

Name of Interviewee: Dr. Char Rae

Date of Interview: 11/07/2017

Edlabor, Democrats. (2007, June 14). Ledbetter V. Goodyear Equal Pay Hearing: Lilly Ledbetter. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?=jRpYoUu5XHO

Hooks, Bell (1984). Re-thinking the Nature of Work.

Kittay, Eva (1999). Love’s Labor.

Marsan, Loran (2017, October 24). Standpoint, Families, and Work. The Wage Gap by Gender

and Race.

Shaw, Susan & Lee, Janet (2015). Paid Labor.

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