WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2023
Today, it's the gender wage gap: Way back on October 19, Kevin Drum offered a post which included some information about the gender wage gap.
Actually, his post reported some information about the gender earning gap. He offered a graphic which showed, among other things, that white women in this country earn 82.9% as much as white men.
More precisely, his graphic reported that the "median weekly earning" of white women is only 82.9% that of white men! That said, Drum also offered these important words of warning:
"This doesn't account for educational levels, experience, or type of job. It's just the raw overall numbers."
According to Drum, that statistic isn't a measure of how much men and women are paid for doing the same (or equal) work. It's just a comparison of how much money white women took home each week as compared to white men.
We would have liked it even better if Kevin had offered even more detail about what is and isn't included in this latest comparison. For example:
Have the figures been adjusted for number of hours worked by men as compared to women? Often, the answer is no when these sorts of comparisons appear.
We would have liked it even better if Kevin had provided more detail. That said, he offered the sort of clarification which is very rarely offered with comparison of this type.
This morning, the New York Times attempts to deal with this same technical matter. In our view, the Times tried to do that and failed.
Yesterday afternoon, we showed you the way a Times contributor (a UPenn professor!) struggled and flailed with various test score issues. To refresh yourself, just click here.
Today, Kwai and Gross struggle and flail with the most elementary technical elements of the "gender wage gap." They do so in a news report which bears this intriguing headline:
Women in Iceland Go on Strike Against Gender Inequality
"Alongside gender wage and pay parity," Kwai and Gross report, "the protest will also highlight the problem of violence against women."
The problem of violence against women is worldwide and thoroughly real. In our view, Kwai and Gross stumble and fall, in thoroughly typical ways, when they attempt to deal with the "gender wage and pay parity" issue.
What's up with "gender wage and pay parity" in highly progressive Iceland? In this passage, Kwai and Gross, and/or their editors, attempt to lay it out.
KWAI AND GROSS (10/25/23): Iceland has made big strides toward gender equality. For the 14th consecutive year, the nation had the best overall score on the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report, published in June. In 2018, Iceland put in place a new law that required companies and government agencies to prove that they were paying men and women equally.
But inequalities have persisted. Parity scores in wages and in representation among senior officials have slipped since 2021 and the numbers are now closer to 2017 levels, according to the World Economic Forum report. The wage gap, which refers to the difference between the median earnings of women relative to the median earnings of men, is 21 percent. ...
According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the gender wage gap in Iceland is wider than the gap in Belgium and Italy, but far narrower than in Britain, Germany, the United States and Japan. Europe has the highest gender parity of all regions, the World Economic Forum report found.
That's what readers were offered in this morning's New York Times. Such readers may have believed that they understood what they read.
We'll guess that they pretty much didn't—that they pretty much couldn't understand, thanks to the reliable technical incompetence of the heralded New York Times.
For starters, what are we told in that passage about "the gender wage gap?" We seem to be told that it's a measure of "the difference between the median earnings of women relative to the median earnings of men"—and also that, in Iceland, the difference is 21 percent.
Is that supposed to be the difference in pay received by Iceland's women "for the exact same work"—for working the same number of hours at the same occupations?
Unlike Drum, Kwai and Gross don't specifically say. And uh-oh:
When you click the link to the (incredibly lengthy and complex) report by the World Economic Forum, that report refers to "wages for similar work," whatever that's supposed to mean. But the report also says this:
WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM: When it comes to wages for similar work, the only countries in which the gender gap is perceived as more than 80% closed are Albania (85.8%) and Burundi (84.1%). Merely a quarter of the 146 economies included in this year’s edition score between 70%-80% on this indicator. These include some of the most advanced economies, such as Iceland (78.4% of gap closed), Singapore (78.3%), United Arab Emirates (77.6%), United States (77.3%), Finland (76.3%), Qatar (74.5%), Saudi Arabia (74.1%), Lithuania (74.1%), Slovenia (73.5%), Bahrain (72.8%), Estonia (71.4%), Barbados (71.2%), Luxembourg (70.4%), New Zealand (70.4%), Switzerland (70.3%), and Latvia (70.1%)...
That passage might seem to support the claim that the "wage gap" in Iceland stands at 21 percent (more specifically, 21.4%). But uh-oh! In that same passage, the "wage gap" in the United States is said to be only one point larger (22.7%)!
That seems to suggest that the "wage gap" in the U.S., however defined, is virtually the same as in Iceland. But then, without explanation or further ado, Kwai and Gross refer to an OECD report which supposedly says that "the gender wage gap in Iceland is...far narrower than in the United States."
That claim seems to be supported if you look at a puzzling graphic supplied within the OECD report to which the reporters link.
But alas! The OECD's numbers for Iceland and the U.S. do not correlate with the numbers offered in the report by the World Economic Forum. Meanwhile, this is the puzzling way the OECD defines the gender wage gap:
The gender wage gap is defined as the difference between median earnings of men and women relative to median earnings of men.
"The difference between median earnings of men and women relative to median earnings of men?" We can't necessarily say that we actually know what that actually means. Nor do we have any confidence that Kwai and Gross, and their editors, have any idea what's really involved in the various dueling numbers found in the lengthy, complex reports to which they offer links.
Almost everyone agrees! Men and women should receive equal pay for doing the same work!
That said, our blue team loves the claim that a very large "gender wage gap" still exists. No matter how often we get corrected concerning inaccurate claims emerging from that preferred Storyline, we keep repeating such claims, and reporters at the New York Times seem no more able to deal with such topics than they're able to deal with the very minor complexities of domestic or international public school test scores.
How large is the gender wage gap in Iceland? We have no idea!
Partly, that's because of the unbelievably convoluted presentations of the OECD and the World Economic Forum. Partly, though, it's because of the fact that we read the New York Times.
In this morning's report, Kwai and Gross threw some numbers around and let our dreams do the rest. Despite what we may be inclined to think, this is the way the brightest lights at the top of our press corps routinely deal with basic statistical natters of this familiar type.
Many went to the finest schools. All too often, again and again, these people don't seem to be competent.
This is the actual level of competence of our "highly educated" journalistic elite. This is the best such people can do, despite what we're trained to think.
Meanwhile, how large is our nation's gender wage gap? We would have liked it better if he had gone into more detail, but Kevin Drum taught us to look before we leap when we deal with such questions.
Statistics are a means to an end, not an end in themselves. They are selected and used in accordance with the purposes and questions of the researcher, not for their own sake.
ReplyDeleteToday, Somerby again blames someone for using statistics differently than he might have. First he says:
"Yesterday afternoon, we showed you the way a Times contributor (a UPenn professor!) struggled and flailed with various test score issues."
That contributor was not struggling or flailing. He merely had different purposes than Somerby. This is akin to blaming a columnist for not discussing what Somerby wants him to, something Somerby regularly criticizes various writers for doing. But each author has the right to express whatever he or she wishes -- that is what freedom of expression means.
Today, Somerby is back at it. He thinks it should always be pointed out that women work fewer hours because his vested interest is in showing that women are not discriminated against. But if women work fewer hours, is it by choice or because of factors that women suffer while men do not? Somerby is entirely unwilling to examine the structural inequalities that women face.
Why would a woman with the same training and experience engage in part time work? Usually because she has child care responsibilities that interfere with working more hours. Why are women more often allocated those child care duties in the home? Because men consider their own work more important, because they assume child raising is "women's work" and because they argue that since they are paid more for their work, the lower wage earner should forfeit her career to care for the kids on a regular basis. These are part of the inequalities that women face that results in that gender gap, the FACT that women earn less than men dollar for dollar without any self-serving adjustments to make men appear less misogynist in our society.
The statistical hacking in the remainder of this essay, in which Somerby gnaws at the differences between the US and ICELAND of all places, is a diversion from the FACT that women continue to earn less because they are not treated the same, in their families or in the workplace, compared to men.
Finally, if Somerby is taking statistics lessons from Kevin Drum, it is the blind leading the blind. Next he will be quoting Scott Adams (Dilbert) about women in the workplace. Today's essay is a joke, an excuse to rail about the way women complain even when men are nice enough to let them work at all.
Here is the antidote to Somerby's sexist garbage:
"Harvard professor Claudia Goldin was awarded the Nobel Prize in economics this morning for her research on women at work. She became the third woman in history to win the prize after Elinor Ostrom in 2009 and Esther Duflo in 2019."
Understanding the Gender Gap: An Economic History of American Women (NBER Series on Long-Term Factors in Economic Development)
https://www.amazon.com/Understanding-Gender-Gap-Long-Term-Development/dp/0195072707/ref=asc_df_0195072707/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312820231662&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=138829739113845069&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9028791&hvtargid=pla-488766863424&psc=1&tag=&ref=&adgrpid=67906663571&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvadid=312820231662&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=138829739113845069&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9028791&hvtargid=pla-488766863424
That's quite a link!
DeleteOr you can search for the book at Amazon by title and author.
DeleteThis is a technical point and it applies to Paul Krugman as well as Claudia Golding: there is no Nobel Prize in Economics.
Delete"The Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, officially the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel (Swedish: Sveriges riksbanks pris i ekonomisk vetenskap till Alfred Nobels minne), is an economics award administered by the Nobel Foundation."
Delete"Almost everyone agrees! Men and women should receive equal pay for doing the same work!"
ReplyDeleteSomerby might be less puzzled about the differences in statistics which reflect the differences in work opportunities if he understand that it is not just equal pay for equal work that matters but all of the workiing conditions under which men and women work.
For example, there was an article in the NY Times a few weeks ago that reported that women are not permitted to work as truck drivers. Why isn't that discrimination against women? There have been ongoing comparisons of women's roles and pay in high paying fields such as sports and film acting, directing and producing. The stats on discrimination in those areas are unequivocal and show huge disparities. Women are only 28.7% of the current House of Representatives and 25% of the Senate. Is that equality? In contrast, Iceland requires that half of its legislature be female and it has a female Prime Minister.
Work leads to pensions, but women earn far less money in their careers and thus have much lower pensions in retirement despite living longer than men. Part time jobs are less likely to lead to retirement benefits or other types of benefits.
"As of December 31, 2021, the average Social Security payment for all retirees was $1,658.03 a month, according to the Social Security Administration's Annual Statistical Supplement for 2022. For men, the overall average was $1,838.08. For women, the average was $1,483.75 — a difference of $354.33 per month."
Someone used a different statistic than someone else. Somerby pretends that invalidates all claims that women earn less than men, and all comparisons between Iceland and the US, plus it makes two reporters incompetent. Those conclusions from such slim evidence reveal Somerby's ulterior motives and his animus toward Kwai and Gross, but this subject is too important to rest on Somerby's stupid and misguided critiicism of use of two different sources, when he thinks an entirely different subject should be discussed -- the inadequacy of women's claims to unjust treatment in the workplace (including at home where women do most of the domestic and child care work but are unpaid).
If you read the list of nations whose gender gap is larger than ours, you will see that European countries are above us and less democratic and less developed nations are below us, as claimed by Kawi and Gross. What matters in that comparison is whether the measures compared are the same across countries, not whether they are the same as other measures used for other purposes and calculated in other ways. That is Somerby's thumb on the scales, his own distraction from a finding that DOES NOT support his prejudices.
ReplyDelete"We can't necessarily say that we actually know what that actually means."
All it is, is just usual meaningless liberal hatemongering. Any attempts to decipher their word-salads are hopeless.
""The difference between median earnings of men and women relative to median earnings of men?" We can't necessarily say that we actually know what that actually means. "
DeleteIf Somerby cannot figure this sentence out, he can make no serious claim to knowing anything about statistics. It is not difficult.
It merely says that you subtract the median earnings for women from the median earnings for men, then divide the difference by the men's median earnings to obtain the percent of men's earnings less than men that women receive. Then you subtract the % from 100 to see what percentage of men's median earnings women are getting compared to men.
If this is difficult to understand using words, try it with numbers. If men earn 100 (hypothetical median earnings) and women earn 80, then subtract 80 from 100 to get the difference. (100-80=20) Then divide 20 by 80 to see what proportion the difference makes of men's median earnings (20/80 = .25). That is the proportion of men's median that the difference makes up. Convert the proportion to a percentage by multiplying by 100, to get 25%. That says that women are earning 25% less than men. Subtract 25% from 100% to see what percentage of men's median earnings women's median earnings make up. So, women are earning 75% of men's earnings. In the wording of the study, 75% of the gap between men and women would be closed with these hypothetical numbers.
These are easy calculations that any introductory stats student could perform given the sentence that seems to baffle Somerby. Pretending this is complex so that he doesn't have to acknowledge the numbers is a typical Somerby trick. And this is pretty much same approach used when US women are found to earn 82.9% as much as men.
We don't know which working women and men were included and what was controlled for and what was not, without reading the details in the study itself, but as long as that is held constant across the various countries, the relatives standings will be valid comparisons. There is no reason to believe it wasn't.
Somerby's deliberate obtuseness about these stats in order to provide an excuse for ignoring such numbers is motivated stupidity in service of misogyny. And no, he isn't just keeping the reporters honest. Somerby's essay is what sexism looks like.
"Somerby's deliberate obtuseness . . . is motivated stupidity in service of misogyny."
DeleteDon't you have your numbers wrong? Isn't it 20/100, so women are earning 80% of men's earnings?
If so, what is your obtuse, motivated stupidity in service of?
"word-salads"? LOL!
DeleteGood catch. The 20 difference should have been divided by 100 (men’s earnings) but I mistakenly divided by 80 (women’s earnings). Thanks for the correction. The math itself is still simple and Somerby should have been able to follow it, just as you did.
Delete1 - (m - w)/m = w/m
Delete"The problem of violence against women is worldwide and thoroughly real."
ReplyDeleteSo is the problem of gender pay and job inequity.
You’re right. Men are not paid anything for supporting their wives and children.
DeleteMen are able to work as they do because women work at home, even while also working outside the home. The expectation that women should be penalized with lower pay for doing that is inequitable. The stats Somerby misinterprets are the measure of our society’s under-valuation of women’s contribution to our economy.
DeleteThe wife doesn’t pay her husband for his sperm, either. It’s easily worth $1000 a pop.
DeleteThis is about why there is a gender pay gap. How is sperm related to that?
DeleteStep 2:
DeleteVetting of new liaison:
Fanny van der Faart, civilian.
Thirty-one years old.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobi_(dog)