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Riley Bolton, Cassie Carudo, Bryan Schrimpe
The signing of the Civil Rights Act in 1964 was the first step in the right direction deeming discrimination in employment regarding hiring, pay, and promotion of minorities and women illegal in the U.S. While this is a milestone in United States history, fast forward 56 years later and there are still wage differentials that could be at least partially explained by pure discrimination. While each subcategory of discrimination holds complexities of their own, we will examine the implications of race, gender, sexual orientation, age, beauty, ability, religion, and criminal record on wages and overall experience in the workplace. We have researched each of the aforementioned categories and have found evidence of possible wage discrimination in each one explored.
Gender
For centuries women have had to bear much of the weight on inequality in America, experiencing and accepting lower wages than their male counterparts since they have been permitted the right to make their own living. Unfortunately, this outdated mechanism is still persistently carried on in the United States, many times unbeknownst to the female employee. Some individuals have tried to cover up the wage gap as a hoax, claiming that it is propaganda used by women and leftists. While insulting and totalitarian-esque, these claims still make you wonder – are these individuals unable to fathom an environment where equal work does not receive equal pay? Or is there a deeper explanation, such as the systematic effort of employers across the nation to give well – dressed justifications as to why there may be wage differentials. Schaffer and Westenberg (2015) use U.S. Data sets combined from the 2015 revision of the Occupational Information Network (ONET) and the 2003 through 2015 March Current Population Surveys to analyze this issue.
“One explanation for the wage differentials between men and women today is paid jobs providing more time flexibility may appeal to workers who have primary responsibility as a caregiver for young children or for sick, handicapped, or elderly adults. However, in some jobs, workers who are given this flexibility may be less productive per hour than workers who commit to a fixed work schedule chosen by the employer. These two realities may lead employers to offer, and caregivers to accept, lower-paying jobs that come with more time flexibility” (Schaffer, Westenberg 225). Due to the fact that in the United States caregivers are disproportionately women, this methodology used by employers is one explanation for wage differentials. Although their argument is flawed; There is no substantial evidence that time flexibility has negative effects on productivity. Mas and Pallais (2017) use an experimental approach suggesting that the Time Flexibility Hypothesis can only explain a small part of the gender wage gap.
In an attempt to further examine the issue of wage differentials by gender, Patricia Cortes and Jessica Pan, usin