
U.S. pay gap by sex by occupation - RA_Fisher
http://www.statwonk.com/blog/pay-gap-us-full-time-workers-by-sex/
======
minimaxir
> _I think the graph speaks for itself._

That's never the case with data visualization. Explanation helps remove
ambiguity, and the lack of explanation behind the data source is why there is
an excessive amount of criticism in the HN comments.

Regardless, the graph does not certainly speak for itself. There's no obvious
correlation between which professions have a better gender pay split than
others. If you're trying to make the point that most professions pay women
less than men, then you need to justify that. (And provide evidence that the
chart represents "most professions.")

~~~
Kalium
Personally, I've found that any time someone declares that a given
visualization "speaks for itself" what they mean is that they want you to not
ask questions about it. Occasionally this is justified, but more often it's a
stunt of some sort.

~~~
RA_Fisher
PRs welcome! The source code is here:
[https://github.com/statwonk/paygap](https://github.com/statwonk/paygap)

~~~
belorn
I am noticing that the pulled list of occupations and the generated output
differed in size. Why is that?

For example I would like to see the data for "Automotive Body and Related
Repairers".

~~~
RA_Fisher
The difference are non-published values. Really wish we had raw surveys, but I
do understand the ethical challenges BLS deals with.

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Strilanc
The graph title really should include more details than just "pay". Based on
the site linked in the github page's readme, it's graphing "Median weekly
earnings of full-time wage and salary workers by detailed occupation and sex".

That kind of detail is important because these numbers are de-facto
controversial (in that people argue angrily over them a lot).

~~~
RA_Fisher
I agree. PRs welcome!

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azth
Misleading title. It does not say whether or not the salaries were normalized
based on the type of job inside each occupation (hours, position, etc.).
Almost surely they have not been.

~~~
onion2k
So instead of indicating a level of inequality in pay for doing the same job,
the data might indicate a level of sexism in the type of jobs people have (or
number of hours worked, or number of years people are in the profession, etc).
That still demonstrates there's a significant problem.

There is _no way_ to read that graph, or the data behind it, that indicates
things should stay the way they are.

~~~
Kalium
As I understand azth's objection, it basically means "This data has been
stripped of all context that could make it meaningful". Which is to say it's a
shocking, but ultimately useless graph.

You can say there's no way to read it as indicating things should stay the way
they are. I believe azth's point is that there's no way to read it as saying
anything coherent at all.

(EDIT: Typo.)

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nmnm123456
"...O'Neill finds that when these factors are accounted for, the gender wage
gap falls to approximately 97 cents on the dollar..."

[http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/?Article_ID=22058](http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/?Article_ID=22058)

~~~
nness
When you read the source text, you can see that they have been fairly
selective in the criteria in which they dismiss size of the wage gap. I would
argue that the text shows the study was produced with a political leaning.
[http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba766](http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba766)

~~~
nmnm123456
"O'Neill finds that single women without children, on average, make 8 percent
more than their similarly situated male colleagues"

[http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/?Article_ID=22058#sthash.6sSZrCm...](http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/?Article_ID=22058#sthash.6sSZrCmq.dpuf")

~~~
nness
You can see how that is a narrow selection though? Men and women don't remain
'similarly situated' throughout their entire careers, particularly when you
factor in child-rearing (paternity still being highly uncommon, and few
countries offer it as a social benefit).

In in simplest form that is like saying "the pay divide between women and men
is non-existent when women are effectively men."

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tuxracer
Wow if this were true even normalized for years of experience, education,
hours worked, specialty, etc... (which it is not) seems the market would make
it incredibly difficult for men to find a job
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDj_bN0L8XM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDj_bN0L8XM)

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webXL
This may be very simplistic, and this cave-man doesn't have much knowledge in
this arena, but part of me believes that discrimination can only exist in an
anti-competitive environment. In competitive markets, the company with
misogynist hiring mangers will end up with a less productive (can only pay so
much per hour) and/or overpaid male-dominated staff. Competitors who don't
discriminate will drive them out of business.

So either misogyny is so widespread that market participants agree to engage
in it (collude), or there's some other explanation: risk of maternity leave,
etc.. Anything else? Have there been any studies that show how well women do
salary-wise once they're beyond child bearing years? Any studies on married
vs. non-married men perhaps to see if married men negotiate more in order to
support wives while on maternity leave/stay-at-home?

~~~
jballanc
You have it exactly backwards. In a competitive market, hiring managers have
every incentive to negotiate workers to take _lower_ salaries. As it turns
out, for various reasons, when forced to negotiate for salary women end up
taking less than men. (More info here --
[http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/04/08/300290240/why-w...](http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2014/04/08/300290240/why-
women-dont-ask-for-more-money) \-- and plenty more a Google away.)

~~~
webXL
So the theory is that women are concerned about their reputations, so they ask
for less than their male counterparts. But with the people that a female
candidate would be working with, only the hiring manager would (should) know.
I think this has more to do with the rather recent changes of women in the
workplace than women managing their reputation, but what do I know?

> You have it exactly backwards. In a competitive market, hiring managers have
> every incentive to negotiate workers to take lower salaries

I never stated anything to the contrary. You're talking about profit-
maximizing behavior that we all engage in everyday. What I said had to do with
deliberate discrimination, which can only be profitable if the market
participants all agree to it.

------
Hytosys
Visualizations like these certainly have their place, and I actually
appreciate that the OP didn't offer commentary in this case. This graph acts
as a blank canvas onto which people project their conversational biases. Each
person has their own idea of what the pay gap is.

For me, the pay gap encompasses all sociological factors that lead to women
making less than men. When the numbers are squeezed to only compare men and
women by exact position, the question "why aren't women holding high power
positions?" is implicitly answered with "because women are incapable," and
that's a gross untruth. (This is not to say that such research has no value —
it is quite important in the context of coming up with solutions.)

If you're quick to wave around the 97% number, you may not be treating this
problem with the humility that it deserves.

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halayli
Sadly, it's known that women do get paid less in one way or the other (based
on bls data and other sources that confirms the same). But what's missing is
more research & data as to why this is the case. Such data would make a more
interesting graph because it's more actionable.

A more actionable graph making its round on the internet is more helpful than
a graph that can fuel and provoke.

------
wwwwwwwwww
does this control for years of experience?

~~~
RA_Fisher
Nope. They're median weekly wages. You can find the source code at
github.com/statwonk/paygap PRs with other analyses or improvements welcome!

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BogusIKnow
When talking to women helping them with equal pay I suggest reading
"Negotiating Your Salary: How To Make $1000 a Minute" by Jack Chapman.

When they found a salaray they are confident with, they should up it by 10%
percent (say $66k instead of $60k).

One of many reasons women earn less from my experience is that they are risk
averse during interviews which accumulates over the years.

~~~
nness
> risk averse during interviews which accumulates over the years

Careful now, that may be a commonly held belief but is also wrong. There are
far more reasons why the pay gap exists and you can't simply clump it all
together and blame it on the stereotypical view that women have an innate
inability to negotiate as well as men.

~~~
mst
They specifically said "one of many reasons" \- I'm unsure what you're
disagreeing with?

~~~
nness
The comment had been updated, as the author mentioned.

~~~
mst
Right. My mistake. Thanks.

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ekianjo
Average I guess? I would be way more interested to see boxplots for men/women
for each category discussed. Averages can be tricky to interpret, plus you
need to answer you are comparing folks at the same level of experience and
all.

~~~
RA_Fisher
They're medians specifically. The graph is a visual representation of this
data:
[http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat39.htm](http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat39.htm) The
raw data isn't made publicly available, so boxplots aren't possible, but
that'd be really cool!

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daenz
Some people believe that the secret to closing the gap is to ban salary
negotiations:
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/05/21/...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/05/21/the-
best-way-to-way-to-eliminate-the-gender-pay-gap-ban-salary-negotiations/)

~~~
Kalium
I don't see how that really helps. That just pushes it to being
willing/unwilling to walk or having other offers in hand.

Which is to say it removes overt bargaining in favor of making it all covert.
Is that really an improvement? I have some doubts.

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tomgg
Does this ``gap" reduce as the employees considered get younger?---the data
source doesn't include age demographics.

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20kleagues
More skilled jobs seem to have more disparity which is extremely surprising.

~~~
RA_Fisher
I was really surprised by the gap for physicians and surgeons.

~~~
ef4
The gap in medicine is a microcosm of the wider gap: female physicians are
disproportionately likely to end up in lower-paying specialties like
pediatrics and family medicine.

~~~
ivanca
Maybe they like those jobs more despite having lesser pay? Or do we always
have to assume they are victims?

