

Young, Single, Childless Women Earn More Than Men - gamble
http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,2015274,00.html?xid=rss-fullnation-yahoo

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yalurker
The whole gender wage gap issue tends to set me off, as it is filled with
"lies, damned lies and statistics" and half the arguments seem to exist in a
fairy tale world, so this may get a little ranty, but I'll try to keep it on
the level:

OF COURSE THEY DO! As someone born in the 1980s, the gender norms of the
previous generations had already been blown away. Schools are filled with
female teachers, administrators and policy makers. The bias inherent in the
system is already in favor of females, and yet we pile on extra focus and
opportunities for girls at every level from kindergarten through college. We
celebrate every female accomplishment while any sign of male over-achievement
is viewed as being a manifestation of discrimination.

Today, women are more likely to graduate high school, get a phD, go to law
school, go to medical school. Less likely to go to jail. How is anyone
surprised when women therefore end up making more money? The horribly flawed,
over used statistic about women making less than men has been shown many times
to be due to hours worked, aggressiveness in pursuing promotions and raises,
and other similar factors.

To compensate for women born before the 1970s getting the short end of the
stick, our culture has given girls born in the '80s and later every possible
advantage. This news article isn't shocking, surprising, or novel - it was
inevitable.

/end rant, goodbye karma

~~~
jbooth
There were always a lot of women in education. Just think, not too long ago
the most viable career opportunities for women were homemaker, typist and
teacher. Apparently, though, women have taken up an even higher % of teaching
positions relative to men in recent years.

I dunno if that statistic you're citing is that horribly flawed. Remember, the
top end of the income scale is still operating on prior generation norms, or
at the least has only very recently changed. It certainly wasn't operating
that way in the 1980s. Given the income inequality, the averages probably
still work out in favor of men.

~~~
jdc
There have not always been a lot of women (relative to the amount of men) in
tenured positions.

~~~
jbooth
You mean at university? Ok, probably true, but that likely says more about the
limited role of women in "real professions" in prior generations than it does
about anything else, no?

Not to get too irate about it but I can't stand when people whine about the
success of women or claim men have the deck stacked against them somehow. If
you're going to extol the virtues of being a man, the least you can do is act
like one.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
>Not to get too irate about it but I can't stand when people whine about
[...]. If you're going to extol the virtues of being a man, the least you can
do is act like one.

I hope you see the irony in complaining about perceived sexism towards females
by being sexist towards men.

~~~
jbooth
I didn't think I was A) Complaining about sexism towards women, or B) Being
sexist towards men. I mean, I'm a man. I know that because I was born in
America and had access to a good education, I'm in great shape, good enough to
control my own destiny. Whining about someone else having it easier seems like
a strategy for losers. I suppose, if you're offended, you could say my tone
was sexist. But I was really going more for derisive (of an idea, not a
person).

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Aside from anything else, saying "act like a man" is sexist.

It's assuming that men should bear burdens that others shouldn't have to. That
they should not complain when faced with hardship (whilst others can) that
they should take harm and not object because that is just their position in
the order of things. It's an extension of men being expendable -
<http://denisdutton.com/baumeister.htm> (most here have seen that before I'm
sure).

FWIW I, at least in part, agree with that sexist position that I've just
espoused. But I recognise it as sexist.

~~~
jbooth
Well, I agree with you as far as the attitude, I'd think most men would, and
was surprised that on a "build yourself up" board like HN, everybody fainted
and was shocked by my sexism. Heh.

Anyways -- on that point -- the different social levers available to men and
women VASTLY dwarf any differences in aggregate earning or typical education
level. Men have all of those things you mentioned and that enables us to do
certain things and act a certain way, women have a very different set of
tools.

And those that complain about the situation? Not going to get very far in
life.

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notahacker
It's not necessarily good news for women. They've talked a lot about the
benefits to higher education levels amongst young women, but how much of it is
down to a simple selection effect: women that are intelligent, ambitious and
career-minded are more likely [quite possibly through choice] to be single and
childless in their twenties? Men that are intelligent, ambitious and career-
minded don't necessarily need to make the same sacrifices, hence a male cohort
of single, childless twentysomethings being quite possibly less valuable to
employers than the male one. It's even conceivable that young, single
childless women might be both earning more than their male counterparts and
still being underpaid relative to their capabilities.

~~~
Yzupnick
You seem to have a preconceived notion on the way the world works: Woman get
paid less than men. But when encountering data that would imply the contrary,
instead of simply correcting your premise, you rework the analysis of the data
in a convoluted way, in order that you keep your preconceived notion about how
the world works: "Woman should really be earning even more, but because of
prejudices they are only earning x more than men."

~~~
m-photonic
All the parent comment is really saying is that "young, childless women"
aren't an equivalent demographic to "young, childless men." In addition to the
arguments already stated, I imagine that more men than women in the relevant
age group are childless in the first place (since men are typically older than
their wives). This alone means that a young woman's childlessness says more
about her than a young man's does about him.

Nowhere does the comment say that women should be earning more than men. It
says that if having children wasn't as much of a liability to working women as
it currently is, then childlessness in women would be less associated with
career-mindedness, which would cause this particular statistic to equalize
somewhat.

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baix
Well off men have no problem marrying poor women, but well off women aren't as
likely to marry poor men.

A stereotype, yes, and not always true, does anyone not believe this to be
generally true?

Basically, what they are comparing is the average earning power of all women
against the average earning power of poor men.

What I'm interested in is the average earning of men young men and women,
irrespective of marriage or number children.

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erikpukinskis
The pay gap that most people care about is that women earn less than men _who
do the same job_. Because men tend to work different jobs than women, this
statistic is not particularly interesting to me.

~~~
imesh
This made me think. Could the pay difference be because men work more hours?
There are more woman with children with part time jobs vs men with children.
This is just a thought.

~~~
emil0r
Depends on the country, the speaker, the statistics they choose and what they
choose to speak about.

A favorite trick though from the radical feminists is to lump all the men into
one group and all the women into another group and then compare the two.
Always, the men will come out on top simply because of biology. Women stay at
home more than men starting with pregnancy, then staying at home with the
toddler, a lot of women also choose to work less than 100% in order to be at
home with their children, etc.

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VladRussian
on NPR they said that only 2 areas still see male dominance - janitorial and
computer engineering. Looks like cleaning somebody's mess up is a real macho
thing.

~~~
gaius
Only in one of those fields will the gender skew be seen as a "problem" tho'.
The other, feminists would be perfectly happy to leave to the men.

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hugh3
I'm confused. Does the average young, single, childless woman earn more than
the average man, or more than the average young, single, childless man?

~~~
zacharycohn
Part of the article says that "the median full-time salaries of young women
are 8% higher than those of the guys in their peer group."

Assuming that the article was written well, I would assume that they are
referring to the average young, single, childless man.

~~~
jbooth
Women have a higher average education level, too, though. I wonder what the
number is if you normalize for education, say stratify it into male vs female
for some college, bachelors, master's, etc. Might be interesting. But probably
a way less attractive headline.

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ronnier
I'm wondering, does this play into why I see so many men under 40 who want to
marry, but can't find a woman who will marry them?

~~~
sin7
Yes, it does. There have been some studies on the black community where the
women would rather remain single mothers than to marry. The logic being that
men become an expense.There are also studies that show that divorce is much
likelier in cases where there are no male children or the woman makes more
than the man.

~~~
trustfundbaby
>Yes, it does. There have been some studies on the black community where the
women would rather remain single mothers than to marry.

Can you link to some of those studies?

~~~
sin7
These are just stories not the actual studies. They sort of show that women
want equals.

[http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2009/12...](http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2009/12/09/AR2009120904546.html?hpid=features1&hpv=local)
[http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32379727/ns/health-
sexual_health...](http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32379727/ns/health-
sexual_health/)

I can't find the stories of a regular brother down on his luck at the moment.
I'll try later.

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jacoblyles
Does anybody know how the study defined "peer group"? I'm guessing from
context that it was some sort of age grouping.

~~~
awakeasleep
I think they took an even more granular approach. Thats what the 'young,
single, childless' stuff was about. They were comparing people who fit all
those categories.

------
27182818284
"Are Young Women Earning More Than Their Boyfriends? Yes, but only because
they're better educated."

<http://www.slate.com/id/2266148/>

~~~
m-photonic
"Their research shows that a woman earns 5 percent less the first year out of
school than a man who goes to the same college, gets the same grades, has the
same major, takes the same kind of job with similar workplace flexibility
perks, and has the same personal characteristics, such as marital status,
race, and number of children."

It could be that not all of the gap is explained by sexism. The overall
educational attainment of women is greater than that of men despite the lack
of a difference in average general intelligence between the two groups. It
could be that a man who goes to the same college, gets the same grades, and
has the same major as a woman is slightly more intelligent than his female
counterpart. It's thought that male SAT scores are higher than female SAT
scores mainly because fewer males take the test (since fewer males are
college-bound).

Naturally I don't argue that there's no discrimination in the workplace. For
example, unconscious attitudes on the part of employers that a male worker is
"providing for his family" would create a pay gap even if overt sexism is
uncommon. My point is that it's misleading to say that this study determines
how much of the gap "cannot be explained by anything except the person's
gender" as the article writes.

~~~
kenjackson
How much of the gender gap in educational attainment can be explained away
with incarceration? I know I've seen data with African-Americans that show
that most of the gender gap in college graduation is covered by incarceration
rates (not all, but a lot).

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joe_the_user
Well, someone has to earn more.

When there's a labor market, being male or being female is going to be a
factor in your desirability in that market, since it's, at the very least, a
marker for other characteristics. Same with race or even height.

It's certainly a problem if the disparities get too large.

Now, the question is, how one can determine what is "too large"?

~~~
gaius
The headline gives it away "At Last, Women on Top". Wasn't this supposed to be
about equality?

~~~
tomjen3
Yes, but that was a long time ago - women haven't really been discriminated
against in any serious, society wide way for a very long time.

~~~
houseabsolute
I can think of a few ways they continue to be discriminated against:

\- More likely to be the victim of a rape. \- Representation in the media.
<http://bechdeltest.com/>

I'm sure there are more that a better feminist than myself could share with
you.

~~~
gaius
And men are more likely to get knifed. It's not about competing to see who can
be the biggest victim and win the most stuff out of sympathy.

~~~
houseabsolute
I agree that it's not about competing to see who can be the biggest victim. I
doubt most women wish to be victimized in any way at all. Nonetheless,
considering women have been oppressed by men historically and still are in
many countries in the world, it seems like a lot of confidence would be
required to assert that we have fully eradicated such systemic oppression
here. It would require a level of confidence I do not have.

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kenjackson
Young, Single, and Childless I get. But the under 30 part simply seems to
suggest that men start off paid slightly less, but then take off over their
career. IMO, that appears to be really bad news for women.

BTW, were they comparing all men to young/single/childless/under 30 women or
was it men with similar socioeconomic position?

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jhuckestein
I think the women included in the study were more ambitious than the men and
are thus likely to earn more.

~~~
trustfundbaby
Nah ... I think on average Men just don't go to college as much as women do
these days.

Since college gives you a $6k bump (or so) in earnings per year afterwards ...
its stands to reason that would be reflected in the numbers.

There's a much longer and involved article that breaks down the entire thing
more, [http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-
end-...](http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2010/07/the-end-of-
men/8135/)

