Mark Perry asks if achieving the goal of gender pay equity would be worth the loss of life for thousands of additional women each year who would die in work-related accidents.
The argument for pay equity is based on the claim that women do not get paid at the same rate as men for the same jobs. Because the number of workplace fatalities is less for women than men, are you making an argument in favor of occupational fatality equality?
The argument that women don’t get paid the same as men for the same job is frequently made based on the difference in unadjusted median weekly or hourly wages. The 17% gender pay gap is frequently used as evidence that women get paid less than men for doing the same job, which is of course false, but incorrectly used by feminists and gender activists. The National Committee on Pay Equity makes no adjustment for any differences in pay other than gender discrimination. Using this flawed feminist/progressive logic about the gender pay gap that is used to determine Equal Pay Day, I similarly use that logic to determine Equal Occupational Fatality Day based on the assumption that the goal of the feminists/progressives is to close the gender pay gap to zero.
In reality, I believe the gender pay gap is pretty small, possibly statistically insignificant once we control for all of the variables that affect earnings, including hours worked (men work more hours on average than women), continuous time in the labor force (women are more likely than men to have interruptions in their work experience), types of occupations chosen, etc. I also don’t believe that it would ever be realistic to close the gender occupational fatality gap because it is a well-documented fact that men have a much greater tolerance for risk than women, and will therefore always be disproportionately represented in risky occupations like construction, logging, commercial fishing, law enforcement, etc.
You argue that part of the reason for a gender pay gap is because “a disproportionate number of men work in higher-risk, but higher-paid occupations”. You then list some of these occupations: miner, fire-fighter, police officer, logger, construction worker etc. Isn’t your claim somewhat culturally specific and therefore limited? Do people who work in these kinds of industries always get paid more than other workers in all countries?
According to economic theory, supported by empirical evidence, it would be the case that workers in higher-risk occupations should be compensated with higher pay. For occupations that are physically demanding in harsh and risky conditions, there should be a risk premium; and for occupations that are inside and have very comfortable working conditions, workers would generally accept lower monetary wages for the benefit of pleasant, safe and comfortable working conditions. Like above, it’s an empirical fact that men have greater tolerance for risk than women and will gravitate in greater numbers to risky occupations than women.
How do you respond to the argument that women’s workplace safety has, in fact, been under-researched? The few studies that exist on this topic suggest that it is not that men experience more fatalities or injuries than women at work, but that the statistics on women’s safety in the workplace are not as readily available; and that investigations into workplace safety often don’t consider safety for women specifically.
I’ve never heard that issue raised in the US. The US Department of Labor (Bureau of Labor Statistics) provides very detailed statistics on workplace fatalities in the US, including a breakdown by gender. If anything, the BLS pays more attention to women in the workforce than men.
You conclude that “Closing the “gender pay gap” can really only be achieved by closing the “occupational fatality gap.” Can you explain this? In particular, can you identify what companies should do to realize this?
I am really being a little facetious, tongue-in-cheek and satirical when I say closing the gender pay gap can only be achieved by closing the occupational fatality gap. My point is that, if the feminists are serious about perfect gender pay equity, that could only be achieved by perfect gender equality by occupation, which would imply perfect gender work-related deaths. Another point is that part of the unadjusted gender wage gap in favor of men is that they are more willing to work in really dangerous, dirty, unsafe, unpleasant, physically demanding and risky work conditions, for higher pay of course. So instead of forcing women into those higher-risk, higher-pay occupations, we should instead realize that differences in gender preferences for risk/comfort/safety/ for working conditions is one factor, among many, that could explain gender differences in pay that have nothing to do with gender discrimination against women in the labor market.
A response from Dr. Dean Laplonge:
Mark’s suggestion is an interesting one—the possibility that statistics on gender pay equity do not factor in the element of risk taken by men at work. But it’s only interesting on the surface. It could be better explored, to think about whether women are willing to accept lower pay for doing less dangerous work. He could have explained how the data on gender pay equity ignores the issues he thinks are important. He doesn’t do that. Instead, he seems to be making the case for allowing men to get paid more than women, because he assumes they do more dangerous work than women. The issue of pay equity affects on women who are doing the same jobs as men. So, a woman who is driving a truck on a mine site is not guaranteed to earn the same as her male colleagues, even though they are doing the same job.
Mark’s argument also relies on essentialist ideas about men and women in relation to risk-taking. He doesn’t consider that women’s safety and risk-taking might be different to men’s. He admits to not knowing anything about women’s safety in the workplace—an important topic of research. He also doesn’t consider that risk-taking might be a way of doing man, rather than being man—which means that men take risks to show how masculine they are. Men can choose to NOT take risks; many do. And women can choose to take risks; many do.
It’s always worrying to hear people use the terms “feminist” or “gender activists” in a way that suggests we know how all these people think, and as if we are sure they all think the same way. I can assure you that if you gather a group of self-identifying feminists in a room, there’s unlikely to be agreement on everything! It’s also misguided to claim that men should get paid more overall because they engage in riskier work. Many women suffer injuries in the home which is a risky work environment. But they don’t get paid a cent for the work they do there.
Mark J. Perry is a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a professor of economics and finance at the University of Michigan’s Flint