Filed under: News
Last Tuesday, the U.S. Government Accountability Office released a study indicating that, although the pay gap is closing, as of 2007, women managers in corporate America earn 81 cents for every dollar earned by a male in a similar position. If the woman is a mother, she earns 79 cents for every dollar paid to male managers who are fathers.
One wonders if that data still holds up today, during what many are calling a "mancession" -- a recession that is disproportionately affecting men. Recent data does indicate that, due to the recession, the rate of women's pay is increasing at a higher rate than men's even though we still earn less. In addition, a recent segment by CNBC indicated that women pursuing computer science degrees are more likely to be employed six months after graduation and make on average $2,000 more a month than their male counterparts. Evidence that at least in some arenas, sisters are doing it for themselves.
But these gains don't explain away that 2007 wage gap or why the gap exists at the corporate managerial level. A recent article suggests that The New York Times experts on finance agree, stating: "It is difficult to determine why a wage gap exists between female and male managers, and to what extent these differences might be because of discrimination or other factors, like hours clocked" (NY Times).
And there's the rub. Does the gap exists because of gender discrimination or because of other sociological factors? And is middle management a goal anyone, man or woman, should have? Should we have different definitions of what career success means? And what about women as entrepreneurs versus managers? Until we know why the gap in pay exists, we can't begin to know how to close it.
On a related note, two weeks ago I started a night course in entrepreneurship. Out of a class of about 40 people dominated by software developers, there are four women. As usual, I'm the only black person in the class. Two weeks ago I also participated in an educational course on entrepreneurship called Startup Weekend. Again, out of about 40 or 50 people, there were five women.
What I've noticed is that the men in these courses have insane risk tolerances bordering on delusion. And not just the big risks like starting five startups and going through bankruptcy five times only to try again, but even in the class discussions. They are completely unafraid to embarrass themselves. Either that or they have serious problems with self-awareness.
These men are completely unafraid to ask for outrageous amounts of money. They believe in themselves, or at least in their crazy idea, to the point to where I start to believe in their crazy idea as well. Through contact with these men, I'm actually now embarrassed by the limited scale of my original vision. It's too tiny. I'm not demanding enough of myself. Their delusional thoughts are rubbing off on me and by the end of my night course in entrepreneurship, I think I'll be running around asking people to hand me millions of dollars for one of my bright ideas. I would never have gotten the gumption to do that if I hadn't been surrounded by male business bunji jumpers for the past two weeks. It gets me thinking if this male gumption has something to do with why women can't get equal pay.
Of course two people doing the same job should receive the same amount of pay. Women ought to be able to be caregivers of their children and not be penalized. Women should have the same opportunities as their male counterparts, but we know that already. What we don't know is whether we need to restructure corporate culture to support motherhood, plus stronger equal pay laws, or help in training women managers to demand higher salaries. And how do we get more women, especially black women, to become entrepreneurs?The world looks completely different now from the period of time in which the U.S. Government Accountability Office collated its 2007 study data -- a study that began in the '80s. If we did a study that included 2010, we would see many more opportunities, with their concurrent risks and rewards, for women in the workplace and the startup world.
What do we need to do the assess these possibilities and get women onto an equal road to success? And could such findings apply to African Americans as a group? Leave your thoughts below.
Gina McCauley is the CEO of the Blogging While Brown Conferenceand the blogsMichelle Obama Watch and What About Our Daughters. She is currently completing her first book, 'Michelle Obama Watch.'