Women Workplace Discrimination

No, thank you, DK.1. DK’s Contradictory ArgumentsIf businesses act rationally, why do we need to have anti-discriminatory legislation in place? One assumes that if the US is a relatively free market today, it was a relatively market yesterday, as I know of no fundamental shifts in the US economy surrounding how markets operate. One also assumes that laws are not passed simply for the purpose of passing them, and that a reason exists to pass them, either real or perceived.So, again, why pass these laws for things which, under DK’s first argument, necessarily can’t exist in this completely rational business model known as the US market economy?Answer - People, of whom businesses are comprised, are not rational, and most will fall back on previous, poor decisions of their past rather than making new, risk based decisions which would be to their benefit, because this is how the human brain is hardwired to behave. This can be demonstrated in the fight/flight dichotomy, where more often than not, in the wild as well as in society, people choose flight.[1]Additionally, assuming that businesses make rational decisions, one would assume that once a business is established, and is a good one, that business will endure well into the future, especially in the instance of publicly traded businesses (since private businesses will be dissolved more often as part of the private owner’s retirement). Examining the original S&P 500, established in 1957, and looking for those original businesses in today’s economy, one sees that only 74, or 14.8%, of this set of companies that comprised that index originally exist today. [2]Now, certainly some of this can be explained through better competition entering the market, even though when facing superior competition, the rational, efficient decision would be to switch markets so that you can avoid the superior competitor and survive as a profit making entity. Yet more of it can be explained through unexpected natural disaster or market obsolescence, though again, in the latter case, market transition would be the rational decision to have a company survive.The majority of it, however, is only explainable through irrational, poor business decisions and practices, because people are generally stupid and short sighted, and while this is sufficient, most of the time, when determining whether or not to take an umbrella with you when you leave your home based on the weather conditions at the moment that decision is made, it is wholly insufficient when making complex decisions that have a long-term temporal component to them.In conclusion to this section, while DK may be correct in that businesses cannot take advantage of certain easy, often times sleazy, cost cutting measures for extended periods of time, this has no bearing on their decisions to attempt, constantly, to realize these measures, because the alternative is perfect efficiency, or something in the vicinity thereof, and that’s hard. People don’t like hard.2. Lies, Damn Lies and DK’s StudyWal-Mart, the world’s largest company, is, and has been, embroiled in anti-discriminatory litigation for over a decade now, and while they have had some recent victories in these cases, these victories have focussed on two arguments by Wal-Mart lawyers, neither of which were “we don’t discriminate based on gender” (though spokespeople for Wal-Mart are quick to make that statement when addressing the press), and those arguments were:1. Wal-Mart is too big to fail[3]2. Wal-Mart’s discrimination practices are diverse and varied when it comes to women, thus these 1.5 million women currently comprising the class of this class action suit can point to no one, single discriminatory practice that applies to all of them, and therefore the class should be dissolved.[3]Women at Wal-Mart comprise 66% of the hourly workforce, but only 33% of the management staff. When examining the hourly workforce, men and women make roughly the same amount of wage, though men’s wages are higher.It is not until women are promoted to the ranks of management, where compensation is salaried, that the true discrepancies arise. Average male salaries at Wal-Mart are $57,000 per year while average female salaries are $42,000 per year.Now, here’s the kicker - Women have BOTH a longer average tenure, which makes them a lesser expensive employee because, as any business owner will tell you, turnover is their largest employee related expense, AND they work more hours on average than their male counterparts at Wal-Mart.[4] According to DK, this means that they should be making 15% more than their male counterparts, when in fact, hourly female employees average 4% less and salaried female employees average 30% less income. Also, let’s not forget about the discrepancy in management representation, where men see a nearly 300% jump in average salary and even women see a 225% bump. This must be explainable through education and child rearing since it is not explainable using DK’s hours worked predictor.Women outpace men in college enrollment, 11 million to 8 million, and more importantly they outpace men 3 million to 2 million in private college enrollment, assuming private institutions are of a higher quality than public ones (I can’t wait for the argument against this one).[5]Women did only get around 45,000 Business Administration degrees last year as compared to men and their 59,000, but that’s only a difference of ~20%, and men are promoted to management 200% more often at Wal-Mart.[6]What could possibly account for the difference, then, since we have already eliminated DK’s sure-fire predictor of hours worked? Hmmm...that is a head scratcher. Let me get back to that next round.The final dismissive argument here is that Wal-Mart is but one company among many. This is true, but they are THE LARGEST COMPANY IN THE WORLD. They employ 2 million people.[7] That’s significant.3. It’s All About Babies, BabyWomen have babies (unless you’re a seahorse). Babies take time to have, and that time keeps women out of the workforce, and this time out of the workforce means they will make less money, right?I actually agree with this statement, but does it account for all the significant discrepancies in the wage gap?Well, as the chart below shows, white women make the least percentage of income as compared to their male, ethnic counterparts (since ethnic discrimination must be accounted for as well), and yet they have the lowest fertility rate among all these ethnic groups in the US.[8] Well, geez, now I’m confused. Oh wait, no I’m not. Gender wage discrimination exists, it is significant, and it is staring everyone in the face everywhere they go, and a few outliers pulled out of a statistical study don’t account for the reality of all other points on deflated bell curve which represents female wage compensation in this country.4. ConclusionIn the next round, I will do an industry by industry comparison as well as a comparison by age to show that Wal-Mart is typical of how all businesses operate in the US, since again in their gender discrimination practices as well as begin to quantify the wage gap after eliminating variables such that its significance is apparent, even to DK.Sources:[1]-http://chronicle.com...[2]-http://www.analytics-magazine.org...[3]-http://www.forbes.com...[4]-http://thesocietypages.org...[5]-http://www.forbes.com...[6]-http://www.collegeatlas.org...[7]-http://www.statisticbrain.com...[8]-http://nces.ed.gov...