• Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
    • Access to private conversations with other members.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

Wage Equality

lewisnotmiller

Grand Hat
Staff member
Premium Member
Largely, I've moved in my little personal journey from what I think of as egalitarian concepts to more feminist concepts. For me, the end goal is egalitarianism, but to get there we can't assume a path of just trying to make things naturally equal will work. That's a horrendously broad-brush summary, but is just there for context.

When looking at wages, and in particular hearing figures about wage differences, I still tend to think of it in much more egalitarian terms. Same pay for same job, basically. Happy to discuss why, and indeed, that discussion is the very reason for me putting a thread forward.

A few days back, @Meow Mix put up a short abstract from some research, as follows;

Abstract
Job segregation—the tendency for men and women to work in different occupations—is often cited as the reason that women's wages lag men's. But this begs the question: What is it about women's jobs that causes them to pay less? We argue that emotional labor offers the missing link in the explanation. Tasks that require the emotive work thought natural for women, such as caring, negotiating, empathizing, smoothing troubled relationships, and working behind the scenes to enable cooperation, are required components of many women's jobs. Excluded from job descriptions and performance evaluations, the work is invisible and uncompensated. Public service relies heavily on such skills, yet civil service systems, which are designed on the assumptions of a bygone era, fail to acknowledge and compensate emotional labor.

Later in the same thread, @Shadow Wolf said the following;
Or, put in a nutshell, just about anything working with kids, a huge chunk of medical workers (physical and mental), and some other "pink collar" jobs like being a librarian (and what they do is very invisible and unrecognized).

(I'm linking those folks as I am interested in their thoughts on this topic)

I thought perhaps I could put forward an interesting perspective on a pink collar job I worked (primary school teacher) and on the industry I'm now in (software consultancy) as a comparative. I also regularly used to build budgeting models for various organisations, which gives me unusually broad experience in how people are paid in different industries. This is still all anecdotal though. I have a few thoughts jumbled together, so hopefully this is coherent.

First of all, let me state that I believe there is a gender wage gap in real terms. I've worked at a large company where there was clearly a high level of toxic masculinity, and where you needed to be supportive and involved in certain behaviors if you really wanted to get ahead in the company. The men at the tops of the organisation thought of themselves as Alpha males, and they spent a lot of time swinging appendages in meetings to reinforce this view. For a guy like me, it somewhat capped career progression (unless I acted like them...not gonna happen). For women in particular, and some other racial groups, it was even more impactful.

So I'm certainly not arguing that women always get fair opportunity to excel based on their skill and dedication. It's more the concept of job segregation I found interesting/challenging.

I get well paid at this point of my career. I'm better paid that I ever would have been as a primary school teacher, and better paid than my wife who works in a fairly senior mental health position. In a holistic sense, my job when I was a primary school teacher was more important, and my wife's certainly is. No-one is going to the grave remembering just how inspiring a software consultant is. But...and this is probably my first key concept I want to discuss (finally!) people aren't paid based on how important their jobs are in a social sense. That seems to me to be a much more capitalist-driven truth than a gender driven one. I get paid now because I make someone else money. That's it. My skills are hard to replace, and I can individually bargain my value. If no-one thinks I am worth that money, or that my skills are easy to replace, then I simply don't have a job.

When I was a teacher, with some minor exceptions, once I got a position I was pretty set. Each year I'd have a review, and get an incremental pay rise based on the banding I was on. If I wanted to, I could apply for more senior/management positions, at a point in time, but it was a very controlled and stepped progression. I knew what other teachers were paid (basically) based on their level.

In my job now it's the complete opposite. If the company struggles, restructures, or offshores, then I'm out of a job, regardless of performance. If I want a pay rise, I have to convince my boss I deserve one. I get paid much better than I was as a teacher, but I can easily point to the gap between what I get paid, and the amount of money I have made the company.

So...are librarians paid less than me? Yes. Is it because they're often females? I mean...there could be an element of truth to that, but the simpler truth is that librarians don't make anyone money. I remain unconvinced that women are drawn to certain types of roles because they seek employment emphasizing 'caring, negotiating, empathizing, smoothing troubled relationships, and working behind the scenes to enable cooperation' in simple terms, but regardless, the roles which are paid are ones which generate revenue, either directly or indirectly, not the ones which are costs.

Now, within those roles, there are definitely discussions to be had around gender, and it's impacts. As stated, I've seen women (and some men) reaching a glass ceiling because of the predominant company culture. I've also taken advantage of some of the things women more commonly desire from a job than men do to hire some talented women, so clearly it's not all down to talent within an industry.

I'm speaking more to the idea that 'pink-collar jobs' (not that I like that term at ALL) are paid less because they are seen as feminine.

Happy to take thoughts, or links to information. My intent here is to at least better understand contrary views.
 

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
I remain unconvinced that women are drawn to certain types of roles because they seek employment emphasizing 'caring, negotiating, empathizing, smoothing troubled relationships, and working behind the scenes to enable cooperation' in simple terms, but regardless, the roles which are paid are ones which generate revenue, either directly or indirectly, not the ones which are costs.
A lot of jobs that do require those skills are predominantly filled by women. In my professional experience, case management and working with kids. There are not many men at all in those positions. But even with adults it's still very much a lot of women. And it doesn't pay much at all (hence why I, and many other "pink collar professionals" I've talked to, drive rideshare, because it pays way more).
No, people aren't paid based on a social value. But jobs that require skills women are generally better at (such as having a higher emotional IQ) also generally pay less than jobs where they are looking for those with traits men are generally better at.
Leadership roles also reflect this. Women are generally better equipped to be better supervisors. But they look for male traits, even if those traits aren't good for leadership roles.
I believe it's largely because we severely undervalue emotions.
 

Meow Mix

Chatte Féministe
Largely, I've moved in my little personal journey from what I think of as egalitarian concepts to more feminist concepts. For me, the end goal is egalitarianism, but to get there we can't assume a path of just trying to make things naturally equal will work. That's a horrendously broad-brush summary, but is just there for context.

When looking at wages, and in particular hearing figures about wage differences, I still tend to think of it in much more egalitarian terms. Same pay for same job, basically. Happy to discuss why, and indeed, that discussion is the very reason for me putting a thread forward.

A few days back, @Meow Mix put up a short abstract from some research, as follows;



Later in the same thread, @Shadow Wolf said the following;


(I'm linking those folks as I am interested in their thoughts on this topic)

I thought perhaps I could put forward an interesting perspective on a pink collar job I worked (primary school teacher) and on the industry I'm now in (software consultancy) as a comparative. I also regularly used to build budgeting models for various organisations, which gives me unusually broad experience in how people are paid in different industries. This is still all anecdotal though. I have a few thoughts jumbled together, so hopefully this is coherent.

First of all, let me state that I believe there is a gender wage gap in real terms. I've worked at a large company where there was clearly a high level of toxic masculinity, and where you needed to be supportive and involved in certain behaviors if you really wanted to get ahead in the company. The men at the tops of the organisation thought of themselves as Alpha males, and they spent a lot of time swinging appendages in meetings to reinforce this view. For a guy like me, it somewhat capped career progression (unless I acted like them...not gonna happen). For women in particular, and some other racial groups, it was even more impactful.

So I'm certainly not arguing that women always get fair opportunity to excel based on their skill and dedication. It's more the concept of job segregation I found interesting/challenging.

I get well paid at this point of my career. I'm better paid that I ever would have been as a primary school teacher, and better paid than my wife who works in a fairly senior mental health position. In a holistic sense, my job when I was a primary school teacher was more important, and my wife's certainly is. No-one is going to the grave remembering just how inspiring a software consultant is. But...and this is probably my first key concept I want to discuss (finally!) people aren't paid based on how important their jobs are in a social sense. That seems to me to be a much more capitalist-driven truth than a gender driven one. I get paid now because I make someone else money. That's it. My skills are hard to replace, and I can individually bargain my value. If no-one thinks I am worth that money, or that my skills are easy to replace, then I simply don't have a job.

When I was a teacher, with some minor exceptions, once I got a position I was pretty set. Each year I'd have a review, and get an incremental pay rise based on the banding I was on. If I wanted to, I could apply for more senior/management positions, at a point in time, but it was a very controlled and stepped progression. I knew what other teachers were paid (basically) based on their level.

In my job now it's the complete opposite. If the company struggles, restructures, or offshores, then I'm out of a job, regardless of performance. If I want a pay rise, I have to convince my boss I deserve one. I get paid much better than I was as a teacher, but I can easily point to the gap between what I get paid, and the amount of money I have made the company.

So...are librarians paid less than me? Yes. Is it because they're often females? I mean...there could be an element of truth to that, but the simpler truth is that librarians don't make anyone money. I remain unconvinced that women are drawn to certain types of roles because they seek employment emphasizing 'caring, negotiating, empathizing, smoothing troubled relationships, and working behind the scenes to enable cooperation' in simple terms, but regardless, the roles which are paid are ones which generate revenue, either directly or indirectly, not the ones which are costs.

Now, within those roles, there are definitely discussions to be had around gender, and it's impacts. As stated, I've seen women (and some men) reaching a glass ceiling because of the predominant company culture. I've also taken advantage of some of the things women more commonly desire from a job than men do to hire some talented women, so clearly it's not all down to talent within an industry.

I'm speaking more to the idea that 'pink-collar jobs' (not that I like that term at ALL) are paid less because they are seen as feminine.

Happy to take thoughts, or links to information. My intent here is to at least better understand contrary views.

What the paper was saying was less that they are paid less because they are feminine (as in, an employer thinking "hmm, this is a woman's job, I'm going to pay it less"). The idea is that emotional labor is unpaid labor and taken for granted: emotional labor takes a toll on a person as much as physical labor does, just in a different sense. If emotional labor were compensated, there wouldn't be such a wage gap.

The reason why emotional labor is uncompensated is tied to womanhood: women are seen as just being these infinite wells of nurturing, listening, coddling, etc. It isn't considered labor. It's not considered and not paid for.
 

lewisnotmiller

Grand Hat
Staff member
Premium Member
What the paper was saying was less that they are paid less because they are feminine (as in, an employer thinking "hmm, this is a woman's job, I'm going to pay it less"). The idea is that emotional labor is unpaid labor and taken for granted: emotional labor takes a toll on a person as much as physical labor does, just in a different sense. If emotional labor were compensated, there wouldn't be such a wage gap.

The reason why emotional labor is uncompensated is tied to womanhood: women are seen as just being these infinite wells of nurturing, listening, coddling, etc. It isn't considered labor. It's not considered and not paid for.

Right...so I'm not arguing that this isn't true. But in my experience, the single biggest factor on why an employer would pay someone more relates to what direct or indirect revenue that person can bring in.
In that light I'd see it less about whether emotional labour is taken for granted, and more about how such labour can be commodotised.

If there's more nuance to the argument, I may be missing it, but my boss doesn't pay me for either the physical OR the emotional labour I provide. He pays me for the direct and indirect revenue I can generate.
And in terms of 'indirect' there is certainly a large component of what you're referring to here as emotional labour, I guess. Not as much as when I was a primary teacher, but still...far more than any concept of physical labour.

Let me frame it another way. I was a primary teacher. Who was going to judge the emotional content of my job, and adjust my wage. And then who was going to fund that adjustment. And what would the impact of that adjustment be?
 

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
The reason why emotional labor is uncompensated is tied to womanhood: women are seen as just being these infinite wells of nurturing, listening, coddling, etc. It isn't considered labor. It's not considered and not paid for.
When I lived in Indiana, working with kids and working with child services I made $13.00/hour. It was a lot of long hours, a lot of stress, and after taxes I wasn't even above the poverty line. Add in being on call and risk assessments and all the emails and phone calls and paper work and it just doesn't pay enough.
 

Meow Mix

Chatte Féministe
Right...so I'm not arguing that this isn't true. But in my experience, the single biggest factor on why an employer would pay someone more relates to what direct or indirect revenue that person can bring in.
In that light I'd see it less about whether emotional labour is taken for granted, and more about how such labour can be commodotised.

If there's more nuance to the argument, I may be missing it, but my boss doesn't pay me for either the physical OR the emotional labour I provide. He pays me for the direct and indirect revenue I can generate.
And in terms of 'indirect' there is certainly a large component of what you're referring to here as emotional labour, I guess. Not as much as when I was a primary teacher, but still...far more than any concept of physical labour.

Let me frame it another way. I was a primary teacher. Who was going to judge the emotional content of my job, and adjust my wage. And then who was going to fund that adjustment. And what would the impact of that adjustment be?

What you're saying isn't disputed: it's indeed the case that wages aren't tied to productivity (and I will say this neutrally here, though I think we can all guess what my opinion on that matter is).

But let us suppose that it was: the authors of the paper are arguing that emotional labor should be considered as much as physical labor; and that this would bite a chunk out of the wage gap. In magical land where capitalism doesn't value profits over people and has some reasonable, non-sociopathic basis for labor power of wage earners.

In terms of why the paper was brought up at all, it was only to show the predominance of the assumption that emotional labor is basically a free resource from women because of assumptions of what it means to be feminine.

I'm afraid I'm just going to have to agree with your post without much argument :sweatsmile:
 

lewisnotmiller

Grand Hat
Staff member
Premium Member
A lot of jobs that do require those skills are predominantly filled by women. In my professional experience, case management and working with kids. There are not many men at all in those positions. But even with adults it's still very much a lot of women. And it doesn't pay much at all (hence why I, and many other "pink collar professionals" I've talked to, drive rideshare, because it pays way more).
No, people aren't paid based on a social value. But jobs that require skills women are generally better at (such as having a higher emotional IQ) also generally pay less than jobs where they are looking for those with traits men are generally better at.

Because...why do you think?

Leadership roles also reflect this. Women are generally better equipped to be better supervisors.

I think it comes down to the individual. I would say right now that there are lots of leadership roles that would be better filled by women, currently filled by men. That's not quite the same thing, though.

But they look for male traits, even if those traits aren't good for leadership roles.

Some companies do. But even how we define 'male traits' is a misnomer, to my mind, since it quickly becomes shorthand for what I'd think of as 'alpha male' type traits. Toxic masculinity, even. If we can stop rewarding this sort of rubbish, then not only will we get more female leaders, but we'll get more diverse male leaders.

I believe it's largely because we severely undervalue emotions.

No offence, but that seems tightly bound to the jobs you've held, etc.
When I was a teacher, we did all sorts of things to make ourselves 'more business-like', but ultimately is was a parody of how a real business generally operates (not that I knew that at the time).
My job, and the team I manage, are basically doing complex customer service roles, dealing with people from AP clerks up to CIOs, often in the same day. That takes a high degree of emotional intelligence and communication skills to do properly, and the people who prosper shift rapidly between personas. For whatever reason, females have been under-represented in our industry, although there is no reason for them to be (apart from inflexible hours and travel, which tends to impact women more).

We've consciously tried to address the inflexible hours and travel to the best of our ability, and now have a team which is basically 50/50 gender split. The women are paid (on average) the same as the men, if you exclude upper management, but males still dominate those positions. However, by addressing the consulting positions, including the senior ones, I would hope management positions become 50/50 over time.

At no time do we discuss emotions in direct terms, but the ability of people to cope with stressful situations, to be able to escalate issues, but only when they are issues, to be able to self-motivate and work independently, and basically to be stable and trusted advisors for all sorts of diverse people are highly valued. Much more highly than technical skills, in fact. We can train technical skills more easily than 'soft' skills.

There is no reason for us to undervalue emotional skills, so we don't. Other companies do (including one I worked for) do, and they are suffering in the workplace for it. The value of any skills, in a capitalistic sense, comes from the ability to commodotise it, or otherwise have it contribute to revenue, or reduce cost, whether directly or indirectly.

If you're suggesting we should scrap the entire system, and build something that pays people in a completely different manner, then that's a different argument, I guess.
 

lewisnotmiller

Grand Hat
Staff member
Premium Member
What you're saying isn't disputed: it's indeed the case that wages aren't tied to productivity (and I will say this neutrally here, though I think we can all guess what my opinion on that matter is).

But let us suppose that it was: the authors of the paper are arguing that emotional labor should be considered as much as physical labor; and that this would bite a chunk out of the wage gap. In magical land where capitalism doesn't value profits over people and has some reasonable, non-sociopathic basis for labor power of wage earners.

Hmm...well, I'm a somewhat reformed socialist, so if your basically suggesting the way we determine pay, value positions, etc, is skewed based purely on money, you'll get no argument from me.
These days (in my old age) I'm a pragmatist though. Idealistic arguments immediately become 'but how would we implement that?'. Mostly because there are real world consequences to NOT addressing these things. And in this case, I just don't see it, sorry.

In terms of why the paper was brought up at all, it was only to show the predominance of the assumption that emotional labor is basically a free resource from women because of assumptions of what it means to be feminine.

I'm afraid I'm just going to have to agree with your post without much argument :sweatsmile:

I'll have to remain unconvinced, I think. It feels too much like we're arguing along traditional lines about a non-traditional concept. In that sense, maybe it's more a complete paradigm shift that would be needed, than any sort of thought of properly valuing emotional labour in terms of money.
Likewise, I don't see it as being the emotional labour itself that's undervalued (still! sorry...). Moreso I think people undervalue ANYTHING which is easily replaceable, or doesn't generate revenue.

It might sound like a subtle difference, I guess, but I think it's an important one.
 

Shadow Wolf

Certified People sTabber
Right...so I'm not arguing that this isn't true. But in my experience, the single biggest factor on why an employer would pay someone more relates to what direct or indirect revenue that person can bring in.
In that light I'd see it less about whether emotional labour is taken for granted, and more about how such labour can be commodotised.
I worked for a money mill of a facility that had us billing insurance for things we couldn't actually bill for. We had to word our notes just right, and do a lot of lying (especially by omission) to get insurance, even misusing an assessment to trap people in services.
 

lewisnotmiller

Grand Hat
Staff member
Premium Member
I worked for a money mill of a facility that had us billing insurance for things we couldn't actually bill for. We had to word our notes just right, and do a lot of lying (especially by omission) to get insurance, even misusing an assessment to trap people in services.

Sounds awful.
Working in those sort of places can impact on your entire outlook on life.

In that type of workplace there are other key factors at play, including the ability of the employees to simply walk away.
I'm assuming you weren't being paid a profit-share, for example.
Don't see that as being particularly gender-related though?
 

Meow Mix

Chatte Féministe
Hmm...well, I'm a somewhat reformed socialist, so if your basically suggesting the way we determine pay, value positions, etc, is skewed based purely on money, you'll get no argument from me.
These days (in my old age) I'm a pragmatist though. Idealistic arguments immediately become 'but how would we implement that?'. Mostly because there are real world consequences to NOT addressing these things. And in this case, I just don't see it, sorry.



I'll have to remain unconvinced, I think. It feels too much like we're arguing along traditional lines about a non-traditional concept. In that sense, maybe it's more a complete paradigm shift that would be needed, than any sort of thought of properly valuing emotional labour in terms of money.
Likewise, I don't see it as being the emotional labour itself that's undervalued (still! sorry...). Moreso I think people undervalue ANYTHING which is easily replaceable, or doesn't generate revenue.

It might sound like a subtle difference, I guess, but I think it's an important one.

Somewhere in this forum, a monetary value was given to unpaid labor women perform; and I think it might have been broken down into emotional labor as well. I will have to look tomorrow as I’m tucked in bed right now.

Still, I understand that you’re saying it’s not the labor itself that’s tied to wages. I’ve already agreed to that.

I was never arguing that we’ll realistically start paying emotional labor. I was using emotional labor as an expectation for pink-collar jobs to make the point about societal expectations of women in general merely for being women.
 

lewisnotmiller

Grand Hat
Staff member
Premium Member
Somewhere in this forum, a monetary value was given to unpaid labor women perform; and I think it might have been broken down into emotional labor as well. I will have to look tomorrow as I’m tucked in bed right now.

Still, I understand that you’re saying it’s not the labor itself that’s tied to wages. I’ve already agreed to that.

I was never arguing that we’ll realistically start paying emotional labor. I was using emotional labor as an expectation for pink-collar jobs to make the point about societal expectations of women in general merely for being women.

I have to admit, I'm good at looking at the paid employment aspects, but what I'm bad at is trying to draw everything on this issue together into a single coherent view on it.
Too much difference between what actually happens (generally) and the ideal, I think. The pragmatist in me wants to connect the dots, rather than just settle at the ideal, and it's not very clear to me how that happens.
 

Meow Mix

Chatte Féministe
I have to admit, I'm good at looking at the paid employment aspects, but what I'm bad at is trying to draw everything on this issue together into a single coherent view on it.
Too much difference between what actually happens (generally) and the ideal, I think. The pragmatist in me wants to connect the dots, rather than just settle at the ideal, and it's not very clear to me how that happens.

Woah, did you just say single coherent view? That's a laugh! :joycat:

(Not a dig at you, but at the complexity of the nuances in this subject. I think we are going to be stuck talking in nebulous generalities. Maybe. There are experts out there doing the good work, but my field is so far divorced from social sciences that I'm not sure how to approach it myself.)
 

lewisnotmiller

Grand Hat
Staff member
Premium Member
Woah, did you just say single coherent view? That's a laugh! :joycat:

(Not a dig at you, but at the complexity of the nuances in this subject. I think we are going to be stuck talking in nebulous generalities. Maybe. There are experts out there doing the good work, but my field is so far divorced from social sciences that I'm not sure how to approach it myself.)

My hubris is such that I try to accommodate everything back into my world view. Kinda, my philosophy on how things are.

It's important to me, as it serves to both test my existing prejudices and ignorance, and incorporate new information into my way of thinking. I tend to squeeze things, turn them over, often seek historical precedents (history geek) and if all else fails, I turn to the ultimate mirror on humanity.

Basketball.

In some seriousness, when I was younger I spent a lot of time trying to work out the ideal philosophy. What if I could find the magic bullet there amongst socialist theory? What if I could combine educational learning theories in new and interesting ways.

As I got older I realised the problem is less about finding the perfect ideal (allowing that exists) but instead about tracking a path from where we are to the next sensible step.

I suspect my job and age play equal roles in that more pragmatic outlook. I basically do exactly that as a job (or used to until they decided I was better managing people than BEING a people...so to speak).
 
Top