Conservative Subterfuge

Vote Republican if you want equal pay, suggests the Wall Street Journal. Why? The wage gap is smaller when Republicans are president. Not counting too far back, of course.

Here are the problems with this line of thought:

1. Saying the wage gap is smaller is like saying, Well, he didn’t hit you very hard.
2. The whole idea that the economy does better under Republicans is particularly laughable right now, and always suspect. See 3.
3. Every party magically invokes the concept of delayed effect when it suits them (“We’re just dealing with fallout from the previous administration”). Who’s to say this smaller gap isn’t the result of fallout? Bottom line: this WSJ chappie should consider the causes of his findings (if they’re even accurate). Correlation is not… you know. (You know – he doesn’t.)
4. And finally, let’s say the beautiful labor market will take care of everything. What would be the big deal about taking legal steps too? Geez.
5. And let’s not even get into the other Republican retreat du jour: “Well – well – but Obama pays his women staffers less than men!” Not so. Obama gives equal pay for equal work, he just doesn’t have women at high levels. This is shitty and a reflection of Obama’s problem with sexism, but it a) has nothing to do with any of the above and b) is not technically a wage gap, which is not just about glass ceiling but about unequal pay for equal work (yes, it happens) and the revaluing of work such that what women do is considered less work-y and therefore worth less.

Moronitude is so rampant it’s tiresome.

The Gender Wage Gap is REAL

Now that Obama has put out an ad on the gender wage gap, the usual roster of impregnably self-satisfied misogynists has been crawling out of the woodwork to bat for the ludicrous idea that the wage gap is like, totally OK, because men deserve higher pay. Evidently the truth just has to be repeated ad nauseum by as many people as possible, so here we go again:

Some common myths:

Sure, there’s a wage gap, but women take off from work to take care of their children, so what can I tell you?

This is true some of the time. SOME of the time. Often, what actually happens is that employers ask women if they are married and/or have children, and assume that if the answer is yes in either instance, that the women won’t be good employees (you didn’t realize it was legal to ask that, did you? It is, in most states). They are then less likely to be hired except by jobs that do allow for time off, which tend to be shitty-paying jobs. Or, if they are hired, they are paid less.

Men just work harder! And they travel for their companies! (for a recent example of this line of “thought”: Bloggernews)

Sigh. See above. You don’t have the opportunity to travel when your job is, say, being a tanning salon receptionist, and you can’t travel for a company that won’t hire you because they assume that, as a chick, you must be yearning to pop out children and quit your job in a few years.

There couldn’t possibly be real discrimination! C’mon!

Wal-mart, any one? Lilly Ledbetter?

Why didn’t the Fair Pay Act get passed?