Here is a bit of info from an article comparing wages in the US between 2000 and 2005:

“Wages for college-educated men in entry-level jobs fell by 3.9% over the same period. For entry-level women with college degrees, wages fell 1.9%.”

The article is from this very same site: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20060905_marie_cocco_stop_pretending/

This article is an insult to people’s intelligence.  Why do we get the same lie again and again and again?  Are women really so dumb to fall for this crap?  This pandering?  Are women so comforted by this victimology that they will ignore reality?  Do women like being lied to?

This is feminisms big lie.  They con you by pretending women are paid less for the same work but the figures are overall averages across completely different jobs, different hours worked, different amounts of professional experience.

And because men put more time into working outside the home than women do, men earn more.  They get paid more because they work more.

Instead of women asking where there 25 cents went to maybe men should be asking where their extra hours went to?  the hours of life they’d have if women worked as hard as men outside the home?

That this disgusting dishonesty is still being regularly paraded around is shameful.  This is like Charlie Brown trying to kick the football.  Every year the same stupid lie.  Unbelievable.

Obviously Toby, comment # 44342 is a man. So on behalf of my gender, I would like to respond.

Toby
“if women only cost 69 cents per hour and men cost a dollar per hour, what sane employer would ever hire men and hope to compete?”

If Two women at 69 cents per hour and one man at one dollar per hour can produce as much or more than three men at one dollar per hour, what sane employer would ever NOT hire women in order to compete?

Toby
“equal pay for equal work has been on the law books for decades.  Put there, I might add, by men.  You’re welcome.”

Thank you for putting it there. When can we thank you for doing it?

Toby
“wages aside, women control the vast majority of wealth in this country, and have for years.”

The vast majority of wealth in this country is controlled by less than ten percent of the population. How many women is that?  How many men put their holdings in the name of their wives/mothers/sisters to avoid things like tax audits, seizure or foreclosure? I doubt it’s because they believe their women handle money better.

Toby
” 95 percent of the alimony paid in this country is paid by men to women.”

Since alimony (not to be confused with child support) is typically awarded to the offended party, does that mean 95 percent of failed marriages are the fault of the man?

Toby
“Homelessness is a condition of poverty, so if women are financially worse off than men, why don’t we see more homeless women?”

Maybe the homeless man told his female companion to stay “home” and guard the cardboard ... or save their spot under the bridge. Or maybe she’s hustling (not highly visible) while he begs.

Toby
“why do they outlive men by six years (on average)?  If men have it made, why are we dying younger than women?  Not only younger, but in vastly higher numbers in the workplace as well.”

I don’t see anywhere in the article where the author says “men have it made.”
Maybe women live longer, because in order to compete they have to work harder and longer. The lack of exercise, coupled with bad diet and stress are major factors in dieing from an unexpected heart attack. Mom rushes home to clean the house and take care of the kids. Dad rushes home to crash in front of the TV. Or, maybe it’s that mandatory Cocktail Hour.

Some jobs are more dangerous than others, so speak volumes to the reality that anyone, male or female (and there are woman out there on the cherry pickers ... in the mines) with a dangerous job should be equally well paid.
Toby
“How many men get to stay home and raise the kids and/or “find themselves” while their wives go off to work themselves into heart attacks supporting the whole scenario?”

How many men WANT to stay home and raise the kids?

Toby
“How many women marry men who make less than they do, many women do indeed make higher salaries than many men?”

Some (not many) women do make more than their husbands. In spite of that, they marry and have a family. Would you define that as a controlling woman, a smart man, or true love?

Toby
“(As an example, there are my bosses for the last 15 years—all women, all having more power than the men under them, and all making more money than the men under them.  In fact, a large majority of managers in America are, indeed, women.)”

Ah-Hah! Toby has a problem.
Do you feel you have been overlooked for promotion? Do you feel your salary has remained stagnant while your managers have received pay increases? Do you feel this is unfair, especially given their gender?
Well sir, welcome to the world of gender discrimination! Lots of women out there can identify with your pain.
Sucks, huh!

Please not again, it’s not just women, it’s everyone.

America is a country of growing wage and economic inequality, the value of the dollar is falling, our jobs are going overseas, and we’re drowning in a sea of immigrants competing for jobs at lower wages.

Yes, women are affected by this too.

Do you have any idea of how hard it is for working people to support themselves in this country?

Reducing these issues to the same old Men versus Women debate, just shows how out of touch with the world you are.

“This is a choice? Our choice? “
Yeah Sparky…and you voted him in twice!  Things were getting better honey, under a progressive government, not under the current “right wing, religious, women belong in the kitchen” mis-administration.
“By the mid-1990s, women were earning roughly three-quarters of what men were. ”  Up from your stupid 69 cent button…as if that really made the difference.  What made the difference then was electing progressives.  But oh no…idiots, and you know who you are, voted for these right wing religious zealots…not once…but TWICE!!!

A wise old man once said to me “If you work for a living, you have no business voting republican”.  And if you believe the pollsters, it was the so called ‘security moms’ that voted the shrub in the second time around.  I certainly hope that these moms now feel sooooo secure.  Fools!

Headless

I have to strongly disagree with the first two posts.  I happen to have a man’s name but am a woman.  I have many times been called (by the secretary of course) for an interview for positions I was absolutely qualified for and then been all but thrown right out of the office when they discovered I was actually a woman.  I have had them call me and then “hem and haw” on the phone when they realized I was a woman, needless to say I never got the interview.  My experience has been a pay gap much larger than what Ms Estrich is reporting.  No Job = $0.00 dollars.

PEOPLE need reasonable wages and I know many women who are bottom line managers (I guess they don’t like screwing the boss or making coffee) who are qualified for much higher positions than they have. A few women make it “through” to higher positions but in general that is not the case considering their qualifications.  As for having families to support SO DO WE.  Women who control all this “wealth” you speak of Toby most likely got it when their husband died.  That’s a helluva way to earn a living.

Men die younger than women statisically because they take more physicard.  Many PEOPLE work hard and EVERYONE should be appreciated for their contributions.

You both missed the point Ms Estrich was making in the fact that she was mainly speaking of the pay gap concerning COLLEGE EDUCATED women.

I know several educated, work experienced women who are not earning anywhere near what their male counterparts earn.  I absolutely agree with Ms Estrich’s article.  It’s not a secret and it’s been well documented.  The pay gap is larger the “higher up” you go or the more educated you are if you are a woman.

Your posts sound like the “same tired old, out of context story” of the cry-baby men and the bimbo women.

I can’t believe feminists are still dragging out this tired old, out of context statistic.  It’s as if they can’t get enough of browbeating the men who support them.  No wonder fewer men are getting married these days.

First of all, if women only cost 69 cents per hour and men cost a dollar per hour, what sane employer would ever hire men and hope to compete?  Wage parity—that is, equal pay for equal work—has been on the law books for decades.  Put there, I might add, by men.  You’re welcome.

Second, wages aside, women control the vast majority of wealth in this country, and have for years.  That 31 cents men allegedly make more per hour than women usually goes to support a wife, or children, or both.  And 95 percent of the alimony paid in this country is paid by men to women.  Your statistic leaves that out and paints a very incomplete picture of the actual financial condition of women in this country.

Third, I don’t bump into legions of homeless women wandering the streets, dying in poverty, but I do see those same legions of men tramping the streets.  Homelessness is a condition of poverty, so if the reality is that women are financially worse off than men, why don’t we see more homeless women? 

Fourth, if the 69 cent statistic is supposed to illustrate the straightened conditions women suffer, why do they outlive men by six years (on average)?  Oppressors rarely die sooner than the people whom they oppress; slaves rarely outlive their masters.  If men have it made, why are we dying younger than women?  Not only younger, but in vastly higher numbers in the workplace as well.  Men die at work in vastly disproportionate numbers than women, on high electric wires, and in coal mines, just to support their wives and sons.  When women say, “Our bodies, our selves,” they mean it.  Men don’t have that option; we sacrifice our bodies regularly for others’ as a matter of course—it comes with the job.  That being the case, why SHOULD women earn as much?  That they do is a measure of men’s tolerance more than a matter of justice.

Fifth, the main reason for the discrepancy in salaries seems to be the fact that women are free to exercise choices men aren’t afforded.  How many men get to stay home and raise the kids and/or “find themselves” while their wives go off to work themselves into heart attacks supporting the whole scenario?  How many women marry men who make less than they do, even though many women do indeed make higher salaries than many men?  (As an example, there are my bosses for the last 15 years—all women, all having more power than the men under them, and all making more money than the men under them.  In fact, a large majority of managers in America are, indeed, women.)

Nice try, ma’am, but next time come up with something that stands up to a bit of scrutiny.  I mean, women can’t be victims all the time, right?  Even when they want to…

Ms. Estrich does not appear to understand the macroeconomics of the mass entry of women into the workforce.  Any job that a lot of people seek will pay less than a job that few people seek.  With so many women entering the workforce, any preference within their gender for a particular type of job (say, one that allows one to have a life as well as a living) will depress wages in that job in a way it would not have done when few women worked. 

Recruiting women to higher-paying jobs would raise the pay of all women by giving some more lucrative jobs and by decreasing the competitive pressure on wages for the rest.  But there is no reason to believe that the current equilibrium is not the result of people making honest, informed choices, or that any effort to move the needle would not cause people to do something they don’t want to do just to conform to a political message. 

The wage gap is really an indicator of the extent to which women and men continue to organize their lives with some degree of sexual specialization.  Feminists like Ms. E. believe that such specialization is wrong per se, so they seize on any of its indicia and pretend that the consequences of our choices are themselves the knowing acts of evil men.  But the pay gap is just the reflection of sane social decisions by those of us whose brains still work.  It has no significance except to tell us that complementarity is alive and well in America, something for which we should be grateful, not angry.