Why do women constantly earn less that their male counterparts in a variety of professions.

Explanation: The gender pay gap or gender wage gap is the average difference between the remuneration for men and women who are working. Women are generally considered to be paid less than men.

Reasons:

1.Discrimination

A 2015 meta-analysis of studies of experimental studies of gender in hiring found that "men were preferred for male-dominated jobs (i.e., gender-role congruity bias), whereas no strong preference for either gender was found for female-dominated or integrated jobs". A 2018 audit study found that high-achieving men are called back more frequently by employers than equally high-achieving women (at a rate of nearly 2-to-1).  

The European Commission divides discrimination, as it impacts the EU wage gap, into several categories.  

Direct discrimination is when a woman is paid less than a man for the same job. According to Harvard Economist, Claudia Goldin, by and large women receive equal pay for equal work in the US.[46] A more persistent difference is the sectoral or industry discrimination, with women being paid less for a job of equal value in careers dominated by women.

2.THE PROBLEM WITH “WOMEN’S WORK”

The roots of the gender pay gap can be traced all the way back to when women first took paid work. The type of work that women were typically allowed or encouraged to do was lower paid. These so-called “pink collar” jobs (often caring work like nursing, teaching, cleaning) have persisted in being lower paying than fields more typically filled by men (manufacturing, business, science). Yet the argument that women choose lower-paying fields falls apart when men enter these fields and are offered higher salaries, or when women break into the boys’ clubs of business or engineering yet are offered significantly lower wages. For example, male nurses earn about $5,100 more a year than female counterparts who hold similar positions.

3.Motherhood

Studies have shown that an increasing share of the gender pay gap over time is due to children. The phenomenon of lower wages due to childbearing has been termed the motherhood penalty. A 2019 study conducted in Germany found that women with children are discriminated against in the job market, whereas men with children are not. In contrast, a 2020 study in the Netherlands found little evidence for discrimination against women in hiring based on their parental status.  

Motherhood can affect job choices as well. In a traditional role, women are the ones who leave the workforce temporarily to take care of their children. As a result, women tend to take lower paying jobs because they are more likely to have more flexible timings compared to higher-paying jobs. Since women are more likely to work fewer hours than men, they have less experience,which will cause women to be behind in the work force.  

Another explanation of such gender pay gap is the distribution of housework. Couples who raise a child tend to designate the mother to do the larger share of housework and takes on the main responsibility of child care, and as a result women tend to have less time available for wage-earning. This reinforces the pay gap between male and female in the labor market, and now people are trapped in this self-reinforcing cycle.

4.Gender norms

Another social factor, which is related to the aforementioned one, is the socialization of individuals to adopt specific gender roles. Job choices influenced by socialization are often slotted in to "demand-side" decisions in frameworks of wage discrimination, rather than a result of extant labor market discrimination influencing job choice. Men that are in non-traditional job roles or jobs that are primarily seen as a women-focused jobs, such as nursing, have high enough job satisfaction that motivates the men to continue in these job fields despite criticism they may receive.  According to a 1998 study, in the eyes of some employees, women in middle management are perceived to lack the courage, leadership, and drive that male managers appear to have, despite female middle managers achieving results on par with their male counterparts in terms of successful projects and achieving results for their employing companies. These perceptions, along with the factors previously described in the article, contribute to the difficulty of women to ascend to the executive ranks when compared to men in similar positions.  Societal ideas of gender roles stem somewhat from media influences.Media portrays ideals of gender-specific roles off of which gender stereotypes are built.These stereotypes then translate to what types of work men and women can or should do. In this way, gender plays a mediating role in work discrimination, and women find themselves in positions that do not allow for the same advancements as males.  Some research suggests that women are more likely to volunteer for tasks that are less likely to help earn promotions,and that they are more likely to be asked to volunteer and more likely to say yes to such requests.

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