Jim Westrich wrote:
> Second, women's positions in labor markets are more peripheral than men's
> (work less hours, work less weeks, shorter work lives, entry into labor
> market later, more career transitions, etc.). I think this is an important
> point independent of the first point (I wouldn't be surprised if some
> enterprising statistician someday soon will show that controlling for all
> kinds of factors women and men get paid the same). While I think wage
> discrimination continues to exist, the peripheral work lives of women is
> pretty solid evidence of a wider, more "social" form of discrimination.
> Women--whether its through coercion, persuasion, seduction, or
> generosity--factor in more "non-labor market" factors into their work
> lives. The rearing of children, care of others, etc. clearly penalizes
> women disproportionately in labor markets. I believe the "ascendancy of
> women" in the workplace masks the fact that the non-market work of women
> has not changed that much and undoubtedly patriarchal forces slow that change.
> (I realize that everyone on the list knows 99% of the above and I do not
> intend any of the above to be pedantic. I wanted to clear).
>
This is educational for someone like me who is not an economist.Isn't there a case that can also be made that women and people of color are segregated in low paying occupations, so women and people of color experience a division of labor, or segregation of labor that benefits capital? Your calculations below would seem to support that.
> >> A look at people in the labor force reveals there is a lot of income
> >> inequality. A fact that surprised me while running my own numbers on the
> CPS 1998 is that 23.7% of women in the labor force earn less than $10,000
> >> (both low pay and part time status factor in here), while for men it was
> >> 12.8%. 58.7% of women earn under $23,000 while only 36.3% for men. 9.9% of
> men earn over $75,000 while 2.6% for women.
Also, isn't there a case that can be made that inequality will not be eradicated by liberalist reforms like equal pay laws because the problem is structural. Capitalists benefit when they can keep the wages not only low in occupations that women and minorities primarily occupy - but also overall lower for women and minorities in all occupations. Is this called lowering the wage floor?
As long as workers do not own the means of production won't inequality be perpetuated by a system where capital has power over labor?
Marta Russell