Why Does Gender Pay Inequality Persist?

Why Does Gender Pay Inequality Persist? With the increasing trend of the remarkably importance of the gender pay equality during the past few decades, organisations and many commentators have been paying particular attention to the relative trends, legislations, news, economy and global labour market as a whole to address the persistence of the gender pay inequality occurred nowadays. Pay equity is defined as a particular strategy for reducing or eliminating the wage gap between or among groups such as women and men, or various ethnic groups (Thomas 2006). It was mentioned in the CONSAD Research Corporations paper (2009) that there have been significant increase for women to participate in the labour force, to acquire higher education level and to make substantial real earnings. For instance, Lander ONeill (1991) indicated that Australian women participation rate in the labour force has doubled since 1947. Moreover, it was showed in the Education Internationals report (2010) that the average female graduation rate in high er education in OECD countries is 16 percent more than the male graduation rate. Yet the challenge is that women have been earning less than men all through the developed countries around the world even they are well educated and actively participate in the workforce (Hatt1997). Taking an example in Australia, women earn approximately 80 percent of mens wages (Lander ONeill 1991). The persistence of the gender pay gap is puzzling although the gender pay equity ratio has been steadily rising and a wide range of legislations such as Equal Employment Opportunity and Affirmative Action were implemented to address the issue (Smith 2009; Lander ONeill 1991). This paper will briefly demonstrate the historical overview with respect to the topic. It will proceed to identify the comprehensive reasons for the existence of gender pay inequality. It will then illustrate the advantages of having pay equality worldwide. Last but not least, the paper will recommend some of the strategies which or ganisations can best address the challenge by utilising appropriate non-discriminatory workplace practices and policies. Historical Overview The ancient time of keeping women staying and working at home while men were responsible for earning a living had passed after the World War II (Amaram 2010). The participation rate of women joining the labour force has greatly boosted due to the establishment of some legislation to remove obstacles of womens employment and to allow women working in certain kinds of work such as metal industry (ODonnell Hall 1988). The booming economy and labour shortage triggered the fact that women were encouraged to replace men, who were resisting in the war, in the labour market (ODonnell Hall 1988). Campaigns were also formed by many womens organisations to fight for the equal pay between men and women (ODonnell Hall 1988). Some supporters advocate the theory of comparable worth that there should be equal pay for jobs entailing similar skill, effort, responsibility and work conditions, and that this parity should occur regardless of respective job market values (Grider Toombs 1993). However, even there were legislation, theories and womens organisations to protect women from getting unequal pay; the gender wage gap has been existed for many years. To explain this gap, there are a couple of complex reasons which directly and indirectly result in the gender differences in pay. Occupational Segregation One of the primary reasons for the gender pay differences is due to occupational segregation. Men and women are not evenly allocated in all occupational categories. Women tend to be distributed in low-paying industries or occupations which directly affect their average earnings (Smith 2009; Hatt 1997; McAuley 1981; Mumford 1989; Lander ONeill 1991; Education International 2010; Curlew Weber 2010). It was pointed out that women were mainly employed in community services, the wholesale and retail trade, clerical work and catering; whereas men were generally employed in mining, electricity, gas and water, manufacturing as well as construction industries where men are more likely to receive well above average pay (ODonnell Hall 1988; Hatt 1997). The consequence of setting women apart in certain occupations with low-status and low-paid partially results in the gender pay gap. Vertical Segregation Rather than constraining women in particular occupations or industries, vertical segregation occurs in both public and private sectors when women are located in lower positions and men are placed in more senior positions such as executive or managerial roles (Mumford 1989). Women are given very few opportunities to engage in promotion to higher positions, and therefore women are constrained their mobility upwards to the organisational hierarchy and they are under-represented at senior positions in all occupations (Hatt 1997). This phenomenon is closely related to the glass ceiling effects for women that refer to those artificial barriers based on attitudinal or organisational bias that prevent qualified individuals from advancing upward in their organisation into management-level positions (U.S. Department of Labour 1991). Hence, vertical segregation is another factor that leads to the gender pay gap. Family Responsibility As a result of the family obligation to give birth as well as take care of the children and elders at home, there has been a greater percentage for women to participate in more flexible part-time and casual employments than men who tend to have full-time employments (Smith 2009; CONSAD Research Corp 2009; Curlew Weber 2010; Amaram 2010). It was indicated in Amaram (2010)s study that pregnancy leading to the absence of women is 36 percent more than men and married men are more likely to work longer hours to make up the loss of the earnings for the family. Undoubtedly, it was claimed by many reporters that part-time employment pays relatively less than full-time employment, thus the unbalanced participation in part-time works causes women to be classified in lower level of income groups without adequate chances for skill advancement and promotion opportunities (Education International 2010 Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia 2009). Womens Tendency of Education and Work Choices and Patterns The educational paths that men and women decide for their majors in higher education or universities are different, indirectly affect the real earnings between men and women in the workforce (Amaram 2010). Amaram (2010) showed in his paper that men generally prefer sciences as their majors whilst women prefer humanities and education. The assumption is that men and women are likely to choose their desired majors at colleges or universities that can reflect what they are going to choose for their careers in the future, which leads to the conclusion by Hartmann (2004) that the pay of the male-nominated occupations tends to be higher than female-nominated occupations. One of the explanations can be attributed that women tend to choose a safer work environment such as being a secretary, teacher or receptionist and they are willing to accept less-paid jobs (Education International 2010 Farrell 2005). In addition, based on the GAOs report (2003) showing that women normally work fewer hour s and take more breaks away from work than men, women are therefore less work experience and human capital at work that brings about the consequence of earning less income. Historical and Social Stereotypes of Under-Valuating Womens Work and Skills Based on the historical overview mentioned in the first section, up until the Second World War, women were supposed to stay at home for cleaning and bringing up the children while men were taking the main role to be the breadwinner for the whole family (Amaram 2010; Elias Purcell 1988). According to Press (2006), companies advertised for job vacancies in the newspapers listed separately for men and women, as well as womens pay was greatly lower than men. In no doubt, the historical factors generated the hypothesis that womens works are semi-skilled and unskilled (Smith 2009). This hypothesis was supported by Lander ONeill (1991) and Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia (2009) that womens skills and works are always under-valuated and unrecognised, which causes the social stereotypes on the perception of females capability to work in certain occupational categories. In other words, women may earn less than men as a result of their skills and works were devaluated by the commu nity and organisations based on the social stereotypes. Direct Gender Discrimination There are many theorists agreed that direct gender discrimination partly account for the gender wage gap (Curlew Weber 2010; Parliament of the Commonwealth of Australia 2009; Hatt 1997 McAuley 1981). It happens when women and men are treated unequally facing the same job requirements with the same educational level and work experience (Education International 2010). Although it is unlawful to discriminate women from being recruited in male-nominated occupations in most of the developed countries, gender discrimination indeed moderately initiates the gender pay differences. It was even reported that gender discrimination and bias comprise half of the gender pay gap (Lander ONeill 1991). Consequently, no matter the organisational and societal sex discrimination is intentional or unintentional, it is clear that gender bias is an essential element of the persistence of wage gap between men and women. Other Reasons Apart from the major factors brought up previously, there are other reasons which should account for the wage gap as well in terms of the problem of the merit-type payment systems, union affiliation, and womens value on non-wage benefits such as health insurance. Firstly, it is important to understand the rise of the individual contracts together with the meaning of less collective bargaining like the decline of trade unions at workplaces (Bamber, Lansbury Wailey 2004). Also, merit-type payment including merit increments and merit bonuses is the most popular individual performance pay plans that are widely used in the USA and many other Western countries today (Shields, 2007). One of the disadvantages of the merit-type payment systems is that it lacks of transparency of the pay structure, hence, it is always up to the managements discretion of any individual performance and pay where there are probably the existence of discriminatory components (Grider Toombs 1993). Secondly, it wa s claimed that the formation of a trade union will bring a wage rate of 17.6 percent up for union members (Hatt 1997, Amaram 2010). With the significant rising trend of women participating in part-time and casual employments stated earlier, it is less possible for women to become union members that they comparatively earn less than men who normally work as full-time employees and are union members. Lastly, research was also done by the CONSAD Research Corporation (2009) that there is a greater probability that women may relatively value more on non-wage benefits and other employee benefits such as childcare, health insurance and advisory services when comparing to men. Accordingly, women may value other aspects of benefits other than wage that may cause the gender wage differences. Advantages of the Existence of Gender Pay Equality Despite the limitations acknowledged which block the way to gender pay equality, there are a series of advantages for individuals, families, organisations and economy as a whole provided that gender pay equity exists. Pay equality increases the empowerment of women and reduces the chances of womens experience to harassment, violence and exploitation at work (Cornish 2008). Additionally, it brings positive effects to the well-being and wealth of the families as a result of the increased income, which ultimately improves the situation of poverty, economy and social justice (Lander ONeill 1991; Education International 2010 Curlew Weber 2010). For the organisations, staff morale and productivity will be increased and absenteeism will be decreased if gender pay equity exists in the workplace because employees feel fairness among others (Curlew Weber 2010). Thus, organisations should proactively take actions to address the problem of the persistence of gender pay inequality in order to benefit itself, employees, community and other stakeholders involved. Organisational Strategies for Tackling the Challenge Although governments intervention of implementing fair pay legislations among male and female employees is indispensable, as Smith (2009) claimed that the legislative reform alone is not enough. Strategic non-discriminatory workplace practices and policies should be carefully planned, designed, implemented and monitored at the organisational level in order to build positive images to the public without violating any relative discriminatory issues, as well as maximise the benefits of balancing the gender pay differences. Therefore, human resource management teams play major roles in making every single decision to align with the organisational strategies. First of all, it is recommended to use objective, systematic and consistent process of job evaluation systems to deal with gender-based inequities in pay (Lander ONeill 1991). De Corte (1993) suggested a model-based approach to job evaluation to calculate the probability to gender bias related to pay at work. Secondly, male and fema le recruiters should be involved in the recruitment and selection stages so that female candidates will not be excluded in a discriminatory way. Thirdly, training and development should be regularly provided to all employees with the intention that women are given chances to promotion in a higher hierarchical level in the organisations. Fourthly, mentoring programs with professional consultants or management should be offered to female employees, who have competent knowledge and capabilities, to encourage them participating in senior positions (Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency 2010). Fifthly, flexible workplace arrangements such as home-based assignments as well as childcare services should also be available to allow female employees having work-life balance (ODonnell Hall 1988). Lastly, organisations should conduct a gender pay audit annually, which provides detailed information regarding the gender pay structure and figures of the whole organisation and the per centage of female employees being promoted to the senior positions (Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency 2010). The strategies proposed above are only few subtle pieces of a complex jigsaw puzzle; beyond doubt organisations should proactively look for other approaches to address the problem of gender pay inequality. Conclusion The condition of gender pay inequality has been steadily improved in the last few decades. However, in reality it does persist due to an array of complex reasons in terms of occupational and vertical segregation, parenthood, womens propensity of education and occupation choices and patterns, historical stereotypes and under-valuation of womens skills and work, direct gender discrimination, the setback of the merit-type payment systems, union affiliation, and different values on wage and non-wage employee benefits between men and women. These factors illustrated are merely the key causes and further research should be done to elaborate the thorough formation of the wage gap. It is clear that the pursuit of gender pay equality brings individuals, families, organisations, community and economy positive effects. Consequently, organisations should better equip themselves and contribute to the attainment of eliminating the gender wage gap. Systematic and appropriate non-discriminatory work place practices and policies should be well implemented to encourage fairness among male and female employees in pay and promotion according to their knowledge, skills and competencies. On account of the increased staff morale and happiness at work, organisations can also build a healthy and positive public image that in turn increasing the organisational attractiveness and competitive advantages in the labour market. In conjunction with the practical support by government, community and unions, it is believed further reduction of the gender wage gap is feasible.

Paul Muldoon: Biography and Essay :: essays research papers

Oxford and Princeton University professor Paul Muldoon was born in County Armagh, Northern Ireland in 1951 and has been touted as â€Å"the most significant English-language poet born since the second World War† by The Times Literary Supplement. He has also won numerous and prestigious national awards. Therefore, it may come as a surprise to learn that Muldoon grew up in a home with very few books. â€Å"Believe it or not,† he writes, â€Å"the only reading material we had in the house was The Junior World Encyclopedia, which I read and reread as a child. Other books must have come from the local lending library†¦ but the Encyclopedia was my text of texts.†   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Muldoon, who is married with two children, has written eight volumes of poetry in addition to many chapbooks, plays and children’s books. His first collection of poems, New Weather, was published in 1973 and his most recent book, Hay, was published in 1998.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  As a child, Muldoon began writing poems to get around a teacher’s weekly essay assignment. From there, he says, he just kept on writing. Of the process of writing, he says, â€Å"I do absolutely think of it as a mystical experience.† Muldoon is a poet who is obsessed with the details of the world, and this is evident in his poetry, particularly in the poems of his that I read. I chose to research Paul Muldoon for no particular reason. I don’t particularly like poetry; I can recognize a good and a bad poem, but I can’t for the life of me write one. I prefer to say what I mean, mean what I say, and leave little room for interpretation. Sometimes I think that poets take the easy way out by writing ambiguously about dinosaurs, and then people read and think that the poet is really talking about social injustice or sending their child off to the first day of school, when in fact, the poet just really likes dinosaurs. Sometimes I think that if I wrote a simple sentence about, say, a red wheelbarrow, and chopped it up into lines and told people it was very deep, they’d be impressed. And so that’s why I chose Paul Muldoon. I read a few poems of his, could understand pretty well what they were about, liked how they sounded, and enjoyed that a respectable poet ended a line with â€Å"the.† Plus, I was running short on time.

Guns: Firearm and Gun

Gun related crimes kill thousands of people every day. We see it in the news and on the streets. When will it stop? What can we do to help? Already this year, the shootings in Chicago have broken records. Kids and bystanders are getting injured by guns. Guns are easily obtained and can Just as easily take someone's life. In order to get to the bottom of this issue, one need to take into consideration statistics, Obama's thoughts, the effects of enforcing guns in schools, new laws dealing with gun control, Homicides and accidental or suicidal deaths that is caused by a firearm.The statistics on gun related violence and homicides are showing a decrease through recent years. The data is based on gun related crimes and homicides that have occurred in the past years to the recent years. However, some communities in Chicago area and surrounding suburbs still see large amount of guns in their neighborhood illegal or legal. There are plenty more guns than shown in the media. According to Sta tmasters. com, Illinois firearms death equate to 9. 7% for every 100,000 deaths in America.This percentage is very low compared to District of Columbia who olds the number one ranking of gun related deaths by a whopping 31. 2 percent. Alaska has the second highest deaths by firearms at 20 percent. The lowest is Hawaii with 2. 8 percent and the second lowest is Massachusetts with 3. 1(Crime Statistics > Firearms Death Rate per 100,000 (most recent) by state. N. p. : StateMaster. com, 2002. Web. 10 Dec. 2012). While these numbers are from 2002 there hasn't been any changes in rankings much.What statistics show about gun violence is beneficial to everyone because it shows us what is really going on in the world? It allows people to e more aware of their surroundings and understand what is happening in their neighborhoods. When a leader expresses their opinions, I feel people would actually take this topic into consideration. The person we call our leader is President Obama. President O bama's thoughts on guns, is in order to prevent gun crimes, we should limit the people we give guns too.By doing background checks and/or psych evaluations, we will discover if they are mentally stable to possess a gun (Shen, Aviva. Obama: Gun Control ‘Should Be Common Sense'. N. p. : n. p. , n. d. Web. 10 Dec. 2012). Some people might think that this is conflicting with their constitutional right to bear arms; however they have not given thought to if the person's mental capacity is or isn't stable and if they are prone to violence or not. Ask yourself, would you rather have a stable person with a gun around you, or an unstable person with a gun?Did you know that there are schools that allow college students to bare arms on campus? Arizona College is trying to pass the law for guns to be allowed. They think knows that guns or provoking violence makes things so much worse. Arizona's three tate universities estimate that a bill that would allow guns on campus would cost million s of dollars in one-time and annual expenses. (Ryman, Anne. N. p. : n. p. , 2012. Web. 6 Dec. 2012) the legislation would result in an additional $13. 3million in one- time expenses and an additional $3. million in annual operating costs at Arizona State University, University of Arizona and Northern Arizona University. There are people who oppose that proposal, and won't accept it. But on the other hand, there are people who support this decision and feel it would keep them free from danger. There are people in this country who think having guns will solve all their solutions. Well through what data that is collected, it hasn't. There are laws in different states that say you should ‘stand your ground' and shoot first if threatened, that law got a kid named Traywon Martin killed.Traynv'on Martin was born February 5, 1995 and died February 26, 2012, by a man who was 28 year old man named, George Zimmerman. Mr. Zimmerman felt he was doing that law Justice by shooting the 17 yea r old boy in his chest, but all the boy was doing was walking around a neighborhood where he isited his father and his fianc ©s home only holding a bag of skittles (Traywon Martin Case (George Zimmerman). N. p. : The New York Times, 2012. Web. 10 Dec. 2012). By this law a man is not serving the appropriate time for murdering a child.The law needs to help prevent guns from getting into the wrong hands by having people who own guns actually have legal permits and the guns shops that are selling them need to have background check on the owners. The law also needs to ban the selling of firearms on the internet. I feel greater about the selling the firearms online, because of recent events. On July 20, of 2012, a man named James Eagan Holmes, Killed 12 and injured 58 People in Aurora, Colorado at a premiere of The Dark Knight Rise (Almasy, Steve.

The Holocaust A Disturbing Element Of European History...

The Holocaust was a disturbing unique element of European history; it refers to the period from 30th January 1933 when Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany to 5th May 1945 when the Second World War officially ended. â€Å"The Nazis, who came into power believed that Germans were â€Å"racially superior† and that the Jews, deemed â€Å"inferior,† were an alien threat to the so-called German racial community.† The Holocaust was responsible for murdering six million of the Jewish residence in Europe, the deaths represented two-thirds of the European Jewish population; the Jewish public was the Nazi regime’s primary target and the regime sought to wipe out the entire Jewish populace. The Nazi’s claimed that the Jews corrupted Germany and illustrated Jews as evil, Nazi’s believe that they could justify their treatment of Jews based on their racial theories. The Jewish inhabitants of Germany were murdered with the cruelest methods; they suf fered from forced labor, starvation, disease, mass shootings, and the most notorious was gassing. Men and women experienced related traumas, while being held imprisoned in the concentration camps and or death camps; however, women endured incomparable circumstances that we cannot expect men to apprehend. In Michael R. Marrus’s book â€Å"The Holocaust in History† he discusses that historians â€Å"fear that they might diminish the horror evoked by the event, or lessen the respect accorded the most traumatic experience of the Jewish people living in memory.† IShow MoreRelatedEssay on Gypsies1623 Words   |  7 Pagesother people’s wars, and more than half a million were slaughtered in the Holocaust. Roma misfortune can be attributed to the vicious cycle of poverty that paralyzes so many minorities situated in an unforgiving society. 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