THE "GENDER WAGE GAP" IS BOGUS

The 77 cents to the dollar figure that is bandied about so commonly is a "raw gender wage gap," the ratio of the median earnings of women and the median earnings of men. That's not as important. You have to compare apples to apples, taking into accounts such obvious factors as career fields, experience, education, and so on. If you don't account for the factors it's a completely meaningless statistic. Worse, it's a pernicious one, meant to deceive and create the impression of drastic discrimination where none exists. It is a fact that there are all sorts of factors therefore unconsidered that have nothing to do with minimizing women's accomplishments, but rather respecting women's choices. One can find all sorts of studies that demonstrate that once factors that account for variations in wages are taken into account the wage gap all but disappears, if not greatly decreases. I'll link to one such study, precisely because it was released by the Department of Labor in 2009. I would assume this would be a credible source to those who think this is some conservative conspiracy I'm espousing. "Extant economic research has identified numerous factors that contribute to the gender wage gap. Many of the factors relate to differences in the choices and behavior of women and men in balancing their work, personal, and family lives. These factors include, most notably, the occupations and industries in which they work, and their human capital development, work experience, career interruptions, and motherhood. Other factors are sources of wage adjustments that compensate specific groups of workers for benefits or duties that disproportionately impact them. Such factors for which empirical evidence has been developed include health insurance, other fringe benefits, and overtime work... [I]t can confidently be concluded that, collectively, those factors account for a major portion and, possibly, almost all of the raw gender wage gap." Also, "statistical analysis that includes those variables has produced results that collectively account for between 65.1 and 76.4 percent of a raw gender wage gap of 20.4 percent, and thereby leave an adjusted gender wage gap that is between 4.8 and 7.1 percent." The Department of Labor's own study flatly contradicts liberal conventional wisdom. I of course find it unsurprising that most would be unaware of this fact as well.

Here's the link.  Tweet