Something not mentioned in the article is the extra hours often worked to get a higher wage.

Also a woman who stays married is likely to be twice as wealthy at retirement age as an unmarried or divorced woman, and unmarried or divorced women are generally no happier that married women.

The last two facts are rarely or never mentioned in our feminist society.

'This gender pay gap has a significant impact on women's lifetime earnings. '

But what impact does it have on their lifetime spendings? That's a much more pertinent question. One that forever goes unanswered. As does the amount of money transferred from men to women over a woman's lifetime.

'The fact that women are not being employed in the jobs to which their skills and experience are best suited, or, if they are, their contributions are not being fully valued, represents a colossal waste of talent as well as a drain on productivity.'

Just how does this work? The more women who take up full time work, the more men would have do part time work to look after the kids. So any productivity gains from the women now in full time careers would be lost by the qualified men dropping to part time careers. A zero sum game.

The more you pay childcare workers, the more secondary earners (male or female) would be forced out of the workforce due to effective marginal rates of pay when taking into account childcare costs.

'Clear public support'? Hahaha. Ask any question like 'Should job X be more valued' and people will say yes. Ask whether people want to pay more for childcare and pay more tax and you'll get a different answer altogether.

'a colossal waste of talent as well as a drain on productivity.'

What if women choose not to employ themselves in paid work, because they believe they are suited to child rearing? A 'waste' of my partners university degree to the author is not a waste to my partner, my children or myself in the very valued work she has chosen in caring for our children. The gender pay gap she may experience is irrelevant.We are free to choose what work/life balance suits us as a family, what sacrifices we are willing to make, and how we choose to spend OUR income.

Some interesting ABS figures on the Community Service Sector at

http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/mf/6306.0/

http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Products/D872404088A9E974CA25774B0015648C

http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Latestproducts/8696.0Contents12008-09?opendocument&tabname=Summary&prodno=8696.0&issue=2008-09&num=&view=

http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/abs@.nsf/dd0ca10eed681f12ca2570ce0082655d/26122932a97a2adbca256a95008004a0!OpenDocument

R0bert

name me one country on the planet where there is equal pay for equal work and for work of equal value. and why not?

Oh, let me guess, "the economy can't afford it".

Like the famous footwear mob would put it, "Just do it.!"

Nareen Young,
Yes, there is inequity between the take-home pay of men and women but, unjust as it is, this inequity pales to insignificance compeared with the wages of the top income earners and those of the bottom ones in our so called ‘Democracy’.
There would certainly be less discord between man and woman if the ratio between the earnings of the chiefs and those of the indians of our world were reduced to a reasonable factor

Professor Warren Farrell explained it well in his heavilly researched book "Why Men Earn More".

In short, Men do all the dirty, dangerous and low-status jobs. Not many women work as farm laboureres, building labourers, garbage collectors...

A good illustration is when I'm on my way home after a night out, 'who do I see working at 3am?' BarMEN, Pub SecurityMEN, male taxi drivers, male cops, male garbos, male long distance truckies, male construction and road workers working for penalty rates... and prostitutes.

In effect, they are all prostitutes, all sacrificing their bodies and their sanity for money... and that's their choice. But to then complain that they get more pay because they are willing to do the sh!tty jobs... well I say "good on them!"

The other side of the equation is the really top end of income earners...the CEOs... these very few men, they earn heaps. These exceptional men skew the averages dramatically. But how do you get to be CEO or top-of-your-field in anything... long years of long hours.

But it is rare for women to do long years of long hours... very few women work long hours once they become parents. They choose the lovely 'work-life balance'. It's a good life.

Women are moving into the work-place in droves aren't they? No! Look at the figures, over the last 40 years there has been NO increase in women working FULL-TIME... women aren't moving into full-time jobs... they are chhosing plesant work-life balance between motherhood and work... and choosing less-stressed jobs, and chhosing lower pay for this easier life.

Meanwhile, despite deeply wanting to spend more time with thieir kids, men are presured into INcreasing their work hours once they become dads.

To see how much women earn based on gender alone, look at men and women under the age of 30... women earn MORE than men. Men's average raises only once the cream of the female population choose not to work seriously once they have kids.

PartTimeParent@pobox.com

Partimeparent<"A good illustration is when I'm on my way home after a night out, 'who do I see working at 3am?"

Barmaids, female cops, nurses, aged care workers, female ambulance drivers, female taxi drivers, female cleaners, female fast-food staff, female shop assistants, female service station staff, and yes, prostitutes- the dirtiest job of them all.

Do we want better paid staff, and thus people who really WANT to work in the industry, cleaning up our old or sick people, or do we want better paid people cleaning up our roads?

How is it fair that someone getting their hands dirty on the roadworks is worthy of more pay than someone getting their hands dirty cleaning up the faeces, urine, vomit, bile, mucus, saliva and blood of the old, young and sick in our society?

Now, remember before you answer that question, that many of these patients are also males, and that most of us end up in health facilities at least once in our life

So rather than being a gender issue, it is an issue of different values placed on different employment sectors. Women can work in the mines; men can work in kindergartens. Each person makes a choice.

The author hasn't made a compelling case, I'm afraid. Essentially she's proposing an artificial wage structure that is not based in any way on what the market will bear.

There are homeowners all over this country discovering that what the market will bear in terms of the price of their house is nothing like what they think its worth.

There are businesses, especially retailers, all over the country who set their prices based not on the cost of goods, but on what the market will bear. sometimes that means extra margin, sometimes much less. Sometimes it even means trading at a loss. The alternative is to carry excess stock and that has a cost too.

In the Community Sector, the "stock" is the workers. If the price for those workers is set beyond what the market will bear, then there will need to be a cull of the excess stock of workers.

Unfortunately, these sorts of Fabian Feminist approaches to issues that are only peripherally related to gender are creating lots of problems for more mature minds in future.

Suze,

I agree.

But,

a) You are perfectly able to pursue a career that pays more money.
b) You knew the relative salaries for various careers before you chose one.
c) If less people wanted to be nurses, they would have to pay more for the existing people. Obviously it is a fulfilling and worthwhile job even accounting for the remuneration. ie, enough people are willing to do that job at that price.

So, until there is a shortage of people doing the sh1tty jobs, there is no problem with 'productivity'. Or should we all be paid the same, regardless of training, responsibility, and the demand and popularity of different jobs.

If more of one gender decided they wanted to deliver pamphlets should we increase the salary of all pamphlet deliverers to match neurosurgeons?

The fact is nursing obviously suits many women for reasons other than pay. If men weren't more often responsible for earning the majority of the family money, nursing may suit them as well, but they don't have the luxury of picking a job based on flexible hours and fulfilment. So, if you paid nurses more, more men would become nurses, more women would have to do some lower paid job that men were previously doing that allowed them flexible hours, and would be less fulfilled. Or else they would be forced to give up their work life balance and work a full time job, or else they just wouldn't be able to find a job. Taxes would also rise. Most people would be no better off.

The value of many jobs has historical roots in trade unionism. Those professions where women dominate often had little in the way of strong union representation. Nurses in particular (men and women) and other jobs like it where human life is at stake have little bartering powers.

A shortage in a particular profession can increase salaries or other conditions to attract students, but often, in my experience, shortages just mean that the remaining employees have to pick up the slack for the shortage, often working longer hours to cope. It sometimes takes a while for the 'catch-up' effect and often it means disaster or a break in service until the catch up occurs.

For example, in the building I previously worked (in chatting to the cleaners) there was a real problem in getting cleaning staff, so the remaining staff had to work harder and often the jobs were half done or not done to get finished in the available time. A friend who did casual work in a call centre often worked extra shifts to cover the high turnover rates but still no corresponding rise in salaries (which were very low by market standards).

Now if all the employees left it might make a difference, but sadly in real life, it is not always easy to find a job straight away and in particular if there is a reluctance to use an employer as a referee while still in the job. Many casuals are students or recent immigrants whose English skills may reduce opportunities. They are more likely to be exploited.

It is too easy just to say market forces will win the day.

Houellebecq, I was actually talking more about the poorly trained aged care workers than trained nurses, but I see your point.

In many country areas there are aged care facilities built, and thus it is the often the only place for poorly educated, poorly experienced women to find work.

Most of the time they don't even have an interest in the job, but they have to work somewhere. Often they are forced by the government to find work, any work, after the kids go to school.
Many of these women are working in aged care only because they have to- not good for the residents really.

These women are caring for the most vulnerable members of our society.
Shouldn't we at least lift the bar a bit and ensure they are educated better and are better paid to attract more staff?

To say that many women need flexible working hours is also often true- but there are also flexible working hours for other jobs such as the entertainment and hospitality areas that pay much better wages.

How is it that prostitutes are considered worthy to be paid more for what they do than those caring for the sick?

A strange world indeed

In London I remember the government turned a blind eye to illegal immigrants as their cheap labour was needed and helped the economy. It really is a win-win a lot of the time. The immigrants, who were breaking the law, were happy with the conditions compared to where they came from.

'It is too easy just to say market forces will win the day.'
The minimum wage is there as a safety net. As are many government handouts.

'Shouldn't we at least lift the bar a bit and ensure they are educated better and are better paid to attract more staff?'

I don't mind paying them a little bit more, I just don't see it as a gender issue. People can choose.

Just remember, as I said, attracting more staff to one profession will put the poorly qualified into a worse job they might like even less. Do you want to be like America and have university graduates waiting tables all their life? Upping the skills for the sake of it is a bit of a waste of money. Some people like their job BECAUSE they don't have to think or to do performance evaluations.

I don't think you can have people fulfilled in their job just by raising the wage for that job. People have to survive, and they will do whatever pays the best whether it is fulfilling or not. It's a trade-off. I don't think any job would fulfil me, as I don't want to work in the first place. You will always get lots of people who work to live. Living to work is the exception.

'How is it that prostitutes are considered worthy to be paid more for what they do than those caring for the sick?'

I think that's fair enough! Giving someone intimate access to your body is a big ask. I think they should be paid more. The occupational hazards are enormous too.

'there are also flexible working hours for other jobs such as the entertainment and hospitality areas that pay much better wages.'

Well, there's your answer! If women want to change the gender pay gap, they should change to these jobs. Or they could marry men who earn less than them and go back to work 6 months after each baby and tell their husband to stay home because he earns less.

But I think many women like to marry up because they know it will enable them to be the one to stay home when they have kids.

The answer is total flexibility of the workforce to allow couples to mix and match, but I think even if this occurred, you will still have a gender pay gap as more women will demand to be the primary carer and lots of men will be happy enough with this.

In my line of work there just is no such thing as part-time work. But I have the option to do a job that pays less so as to work part time. I have a family to feed and a mortgage though so I chose to be 'unfulfilled'. Tragic I know. I also have a partner I chose and I choose to let her live her dream of being the primary carer, because that's what we have negotiated as the best thing for the general happiness of the family unit. As I choose to live in my home country, and my partner chooses to accept this even though she misses her family.

See, we all have choices. Or men do anyway, all I hear is whinging from the gender pay gap whiners.

Suzeonline "Barmaids, female cops, nurses, aged care workers, female ambulance drivers, female taxi drivers, female cleaners, female fast-food staff, female shop assistants, female service station staff, and yes, prostitutes- the dirtiest job of them all."

When you are talking obout society, you need to talk about averages/typical outcomes/by-and-large/medians... Sure there are female cops and taxi drivers, but they are very rare, and only prove the good point that Houellebecq made... if women want to earn more, they CAN CHOOSE to take these more unplesant, better paying jobs. But they don't, do they?

You are also un-aware that most cleaners (perhaps the symbol of low-status work) are generally casual, migrant MEN! Casual workers are disadvantaged, poorly educated migrants are disadvantaged and MEN ARE DISADVANTAGED.

What a silly point, some men are in hospital... but less than women... women live 7 years longer than men and get to take their aged pensions 5 years earlier than men, leaving them on the taxpeyer 12 years longer than men. How fair is that? Men tend to die young and quickly, an women tend to drift away in nursing homes for years. How does this fit with your prejudices?

But most importantly, you ignore my (and Warren Farrel's) main points... In short, Men do all the dirty, dangerous and low-status jobs. Not many women work as farm laboureres, building labourers, garbage collectors...

A good illustration is when I'm on my way home after a night out, 'who do I see working at 3am?' BarMEN, Pub SecurityMEN, male taxi drivers, male cops, male garbos, male long distance truckies, male construction and road workers working for penalty rates... and prostitutes

Partimeparent <" But most importantly, you ignore my (and Warren Farrel's) main points... In short, Men do all the dirty, dangerous and low-status jobs. Not many women work as farm laboureres, building labourers, garbage collectors..."

I agree. But they get paid alot more than women doing jobs that men won't do dont they?

As Houellebecq pointed out above, women have CHOICES about what jobs they can undertake, just as men do. So why do men choose to do these jobs? Couldn't they also do the supposed 'soft' jobs usually done by women? We all know they don't because the men's jobs are paid more!

Women are often not physically strong enough to do some of the jobs mentioned above, but men should be able to work at any job, surely?
So why don't they work in aged care facilities? Because of the low wages!

Not every man lives alone, so surely there are plenty of men living with women out there who would want them to be earning more money to add to the household finances?
So why aren't we all getting together to demand better wages for women?

parttimeparent,

I like your point about women living longer than men. I think men should be pushing for the pension age to be raised to 70 for women. After all, they live 7 years longer than us so that seems only fair. Of course it will never happen though. Women only want the benfits of equality not the responsibilities.

Suzeonline:"So why do men choose to do these jobs?"

There are lots of reasons.

First, there has always been a rump of boys who are simply not academic and the dirty labouring jobs pay better than the clean ones.

Second, boys know from very early that they will be working all their lives. Girls know that they won't.

Third, there used to be countervailing dirty or hard jobs that women did in the home, like washing in the era of coppers and washboards, or cooking in the era of woodstoves. There was a reasonable and logical division of labour and men did their best to reduce the drudgery of their women The earliest applications for electricity were domestic appliances.

Fourth, the jobs need to be done and women just won't do them. I reckon that the local garbage contractor could advertise specifically for women till the cows come home and won't get a response worth mentioning.

Fifth, boys know that their familial role is as provider, especially when his female partner is doing the female thing of bearing children. That means they are much more willing to do whatever it takes to keep the money coing in. Women, especially western middle-class princesses like you, realise that the State won't allow them to starve or be too badly housed as long as they have a child to hold up for scrutiny. Men don't.

Sixth, boys and men are simply better able to cope with the dirt and muck that girls find repugnant. Perhaps that's conditioning, but i think it's biological. In traditional human environments women tend to stay near the hearth while men go off hunting or warring. It is a positive advantage to be sensitive to smells which may indicate an unhealthy condition if one is living in the same spot all the time. Not so important if one is predominantly using smell as a tool for hunting and moving on daily.

None of that is a value judgement, Suzie, unlike your own value-laden pronouncements.

The bottom line answer to your question is "becvause they don;t have to".

Dopey bugger I am.
That should have read "because they have to".

Antiseptic, arent you forgetting all the women in different countries that stepped up to the challenge during the World Wars. Women can do these jobs and will choose to if the need arises.

Does a garbage collector really earn more than a nurse? Nurses are very highly paid (and rightly so). They also are mainly women, and work pretty inflexible shift work. They are often the primary earner for a couple, particularly if she chooses more shift work. Given a choice - I'd pick up garbage no worries at all (its pretty cosy driving a truck compared to changing bedpans).

There are stacks of women in high paid jobs, but as has been pointed out, women will often choose to be the main care-giver for children. Mind you, I think there are still more cases than not where this role is assumed (preferred or not).

Do I believe there should be more flexibility for men in the work-place - hell yes! There should be more men more heavily involved in their children's lives. I'm a big advocate for both sides in this.

Country Gal:"Antiseptic, arent you forgetting all the women in different countries that stepped up to the challenge during the World Wars. Women can do these jobs and will choose to if the need arises. "

Are you suggesting that we should use the extreme circumstance of a wartime economy to model our modern society upon?

What a terribly gloomy way to se the world.

The point, of course is that women don't do these jobs except in extremis. They don't and won't choose them of their own volition if there is any alternative. A significant minority of men actually like doing dirty and dngerous jobs where very few women do.

There was a documentary series on ABC a little while ago called Dirty Jobs. The star of the show worked for a day in all sorts of different dirty jobs, from cleaning sewer tanks to harvesting a peculiar shellfish that lives in mud and all points between. While there were women doing some of the dirty jobs, they were very few and far between.

Yes, in some countries women do some of the dirty work, but not in the West and certainly not in the middle-class, where virtually all Australian women see themselves. It's simply beneath them.

Country gal:"There should be more men more heavily involved in their children's lives. I'm a big advocate for both sides in this."

Yes, I realise that and so are most of the men posting here. It's a shame that so many women seem so threatened by the idea. the Fatherhood Institute in the UK did a study recently, which while flawed is still a good approach to the issue. They assume that the best way to achieve equity in parenting (pre- and post-separation) is to create equity in the capacity of both parents to support the child. They are in favour of a paid maternal leave scheme for that reason, which is one of the faults in my view.

http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/FI-FiFI-Report-2010_FINAL.pdf