Field Experiments
I found this article interesting. Its a study on the likelihood of a person to negotiate salaries or wages based on gender.
I have long argued that two of the largest factors on the discrepancy between men and women in salaries are the percentage of each gender that take a break from there career for some period of time and the fact that women do not negotiate salaries or raises as much as the men do with there boss/employer.
I have always just had my own experience to go from as I have not seen a study that I did not think was somewhat rigged.
This is the best one I have seen to date. The differences are less than I would have anticipated but significant.
From my own experience women do not tend to negotiate wages as often as men. When women do negotiate for a raise or better offer they are more tenacious in getting what they want and wont give up as easily.
Anyway I found the study interesting and thought some of you might as well.
I have long argued that two of the largest factors on the discrepancy between men and women in salaries are the percentage of each gender that take a break from there career for some period of time and the fact that women do not negotiate salaries or raises as much as the men do with there boss/employer.
I have always just had my own experience to go from as I have not seen a study that I did not think was somewhat rigged.
This is the best one I have seen to date. The differences are less than I would have anticipated but significant.
From my own experience women do not tend to negotiate wages as often as men. When women do negotiate for a raise or better offer they are more tenacious in getting what they want and wont give up as easily.
Anyway I found the study interesting and thought some of you might as well.
An in depth study… taking recognition of additional discernable metrics, aside from the usual shallow façade of analysis… Too bad it is too deep for the MSM and the low information voters… The vision of the old white misogynist tyrant of a boss maintaining the glass ceiling is far too seductive to the liberals… It isn’t newsworthy to say that women are less aggressive and should inquire if the wages are negotiable, or that they have different priorities. I am not sure I like the supposition on pg. 12 ref. “Thus, details of the contract environment have important effects on the gender gap, and with such knowledge public officials can design laws to take advantage of such effects.” I have developed a negative reflexive reaction to trusting government officials to write any new laws! It would be better if it had peer review, for what it is worth.
Bottom line: Misogyny and prejudice still exist, but they aren’t what they used to be.
Aside from the pay differences it seems to have other implications; namely the larger percentage of women who voted democratic. If men prefer a status of ambiguity regarding the “rules of wage determination” then doesn’t it follow that they see themselves better off in a state of capitalist competition. Many democrats don’t seem to like competition. They seem to prefer more equal outcomes than competition brings, despite the loss of the greatness it also brings. Why do we give out participation awards? If we wish not to offend the sensibilities of some, how do we reward and nurture the exceptional?
Men and women are different who would have thought… :)
O.A.
A person who is more concerned about job security or flexibility rather than salary and competitive advantage would be more likely to vote for government expansion. Interesting.
Early in my career, I hired administrative assistants for companies. I also vetted initial applications of for engineers, doing the the first level of negotiation, but not the final salary determination. From my viewpoint, overall I would say the type of people(not necessarily gender) applying for administrative assistant were less likely to negotiate due to personality. Also, markets tend to be more fluid for those positions and so prices are softer than other occupations. For example, an engineer is confident about the starting salary range for an engineer with a certain skill set. An administrative assistant, even with many years of experience has less confidence about salary one would offer for those skills. Even if they have a resume and background supporting say $21/hr, they may or may not maintain that hourly at the next position. Again, still not gender specific.
2.Type of Job: My experience is that the type of position has more of an impact on negotiation than gender. One could say that types of positions attract one gender or the other. If that is the case, then negotiation takes back seat to other criteria. At the beginning of the paper they cite the top earner specifics-something less than 3% females command the highest salaries. In my experience in negotiating salaries with women vs men, you learn quickly that women are much more likely to be interested in benefits other than compensation. For instance, they will be soft on salary if the health insurance is cadillac. The salary may not be as important as hours, environment of the company, even location to their home. This was not my experience with men. Although they may be interested in these other potential benefits, salary is first and foremost, other criteria is second.
3.maybe I missed it, but did they take into account single earner vs double earner households? I would pose that criteria is more important to negotiation than gender. Even if gender plays a role in single vs double households. By that, I mean in a two earner household the female may be more likely to accept less money for the same job than a man (this is an example, I do not know the stats on this).
This was certiantly not conclusive but it is interesting.
I have managed engineers for most of my professional career. Obviously a profession that attracts more males than females. I have noticed in this field the 10% or so that have been women have been less likely to ask for salary increases and less likely to negotiate initial salary up.
You bring up a couple of excellent point I had not thought of or had considered more an anomaly to the region in which I have spent my career.
First the second income factor. I had not considered salary feeling less important. I have always been a single income family and I sopose that a second income Salary may not be the driving factor of the job.
Second; I have noticed that women in my teams have often valued flexible hours and work conditions over pay. I have used this as a reward for great results for years and the women in my teams have always seemed to be more motivated by this compensation than by greater pay. I have chalked this up not to gender but to difering priorities. Only after reading your comments have I linked this difference to gender and common priorities of gender, but it is once again a factor that must be considered in wage discrepancy based on gender.
Thanks for your comments.