Obama declares ‘National Equal Pay Day’ as gesture on gender bias

Submitted by Mastodon on Tue, 2013-04-09 14:30

Article here. Excerpt:

'President Obama issued a declaration of “National Equal Pay Day” for Thursday, in a gesture aimed at highlighting what he described as a disparity between men and women in the workforce.

In a statement issued Monday, Mr. Obama decried a statistic showing women comprise roughly half of America’s workforce but earn an average 23 percent less than men, The Daily Caller reported.
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Deeper analysis has found that much of the pay disparity between men and women are due to factors other than bias. The Independent Women’s Forum, for instance, said the tenure and job description were often left out of the calculating process, and those two factors often explain the pay difference, The Daily Caller reported.'

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Equal Pay Day supposedly represents the date in the current year through which women must work to match what men earned in the previous year. In 2012 it was April 17th. In 2013 it is scheduled for April 20th. Both dates are based on women earning 70 percent of what men earn.

A recent study “Graduating to a Pay Gap,” from the American Association of University Women gives the figure as closer to 94 percent. This looks a lot like progress for women. It also moves the actual Equal Pay Day to January 22nd.

It makes sense for men’s organizations to publicize and celebrate the earlier date (with very straight faces). This way, when April 20th finally comes around, it will just be a lame gesture. And a late one. It steals their thunder. It also underlines the stereotypical view of women as being terrible at math.

How sad that they have shot themselves in the foot… again.

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Submitted by chuck on Tue, 2013-04-09 21:10