Help!! My husband doesn't believe there's such a thing as gender inequality in the work that place.

[Mucky1]

Just had a huge debate with my DH as he is s adamant that there is no gender pay gap!! Apparently he's done some reading and it's all a myth. 😳 women are treated exactly the same in the work place and we should be more go getting if we want to be promoted more.

In some states in the US, doctors' salaries are public information. Researchers have therefore been able to do really detailed comparisons, accounting for age, experience, time off (maternity leave is v short in the US). Guess what? Male doctors earn $$$$$ more than their female counterparts:

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jul/11/female-doctors-paid-20000-less-than-males-on-average-us-study-finds

There was a similar study that also showed white doctors earned $$$$ more than black doctors, even with identical qualifications and experience. Or is that just a myth as well?

Just a thought: you're not married to my brother are you? This is exactly the sort of crap he comes out with, and why I am slowly introducing SIL to radical feminism.

Hate to break it to you but you’ve married an idiot.

''The Equality and Human Rights Commission is investigating the BBC over pay historical gender pay discrimination.''
www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-50128698

''Thousands of women who fought Glasgow City Council for equal pay have had money deducted to pay legal fees, despite pledges from their unions.''
www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-49985113

''Asda shopworkers win landmark ruling in equal pay dispute..
Leigh Day claims to represent more than 30,000 shopfloor staff from the big four supermarkets – Asda, Sainsbury’s, Tesco and Morrisons – in similar pay cases. The total payout, if the supermarkets lose, could be more than £8bn, said Leigh Day.''
www.theguardian.com/society/2019/jan/31/asda-shopworkers-win-landmark-ruling-equal-pay-dispute

So you married a misogynistic fool with a lack of critical thinking skills and total disregard for your opinion?

Great catch

The gender pay gap exists but is mostly caused by sexism outside the workplace. Like society pushing women to choose maternity leave instead of shared parental leave, society undervaluing and expecting women to do unpaid family caring roles(sexism). These are the factors most of which lead back to sex roles/sexism and that we can change to close the gender gap.

If he means anything other than it’s not sexism in the workplace itself, but society at large then he is being very wrong and dense.

I guess the huge, backdated (4year) pay settlement I got from my employer when I raised a grievance about being paid less than my male colleague was also mythical?

Shame. I've already spent it.

He’s done some reading 😂. Was it on Facebook?

I can’t explain how angry I would be if it turned out my husband was a misogynist.

What about the fact that warehouse supermarket staff (mostly men) get paid more than shop floor staff (mostly women?) when the level of skill is identical? Warehouse staff need more strength but that’s not something women can get by just working harder.

What about the smaller pension pots because women have to take time off to do the majority of care roles (looking after children, elderly parents etc)? What about the reduced career opportunities because of time lost to maternity leave? What about loss of earnings because of working part time to look after children and because childcare in this country is so expensive?

This is all documented in many, many studies.

Try looking up “pregnant then screwed”. She has loads of good content on social media.

Some of the ‘choices’ are choices for people - like whether the man or woman or both look after the kids outside school/elderly relatives. Maternity leave is time off work though can be just as exhausting - with shared parental leave men could also take it/half.

I guess the subtlety is that some choices are constrained - so we wanted to breast feed for a year but my employer was long hours shift work with long commute and no suitable place to pump and store milk. Also, if you are tight for money, perhaps in the short term it is better for the person earning more (usually man) to carry on working (though I suspect if you do a longer term analysis you might see that men and women sharing can be better in some situations).

Seems like there are a lot of social factors and systemic issues at play.

Men are still assumed to be the main breadwinner and when children come along, I think there's motivation to work the long hours needed to progress up the career ladder instead of being encouraged to take shared parental leave or part-time work. As mentioned by a previous poster, most jobs and office roles are historically based around an all-male working environment. It's quite probable that employers are more sympathetic to male employees being promoted because 'they now have a family to support'. I wouldn't underestimate the entrenched gendered roles of men providing for the family while women do the nurturing and therefore their career is seen as 'less important'.

Women end up taking on more part-time and flexible work so it fits around childcare. There are women who don't mind this and enjoy the opportunity to focus on children more and career less. Other women might be frustrated. Either way, it will translate into lower pensions or overall spending power as the years go by.

I haven't looked too much into this topic, but like many systemic issues it's not something that is solved easily or quickly.
Good quality state subsidised childcare is important. Having roles that are open to more flexible work and less about slogging long hours will make such jobs more parent friendly, especially for women.

I don't really hear this being said, but I think it would be a really good mechanism for bridging some of the pay gap - motherhood and childrearing should be valued as an important role in itself and a contribution to the economy. I would support a government scheme that pays mothers for their job of giving birth and looking after children. Not every woman desires to be a manager or company director and many women derive great joy from focusing on family instead of wanting to play the career game. Motherhood shouldn't be an unpaid role. It's important work. If we hired a person to do all the tasks involved in a mother's role, it would command a hefty pay. The societal expectation that women should do this for free needs to change.
It should be treated as a proper income, so taxed appropriately and ensure a proportion goes towards a future pension etc.

I personally don't think it's productive to compare different jobs and try to draw some connection between them in terms of pay. It's more important to elevate the importance of motherhood and realise its contribution to the overall economy and look at ways to ensure mothers are paid for this role.

Regarding debates with partners - you don't change someone's mind overnight or by accusing them of being sexist / misogynistic while insisting your own position is the only correct and flawless interpretation. Both people will be approaching issues from their own perspectives and background. There will be blind spots and a lack of seeing things from the other's viewpoint.
Shouting matches and focusing on 'proving that you are RIGHT and the other person is WRONG' only makes both sides dig their heels in deeper. The aim is not to win or humiliate your partner but to reach a shared understanding in spite of differences of opinion.
Often we expect the other person to be open to changing their position but rarely consider if we are willing to do the same in return.

Talk (calmly) about what evidence you have used to help you reach your viewpoint. Encourage your partner to share the same. Look for common ground and ask probing questions. Try and understand their perspective and ask them to do the same for you. It's not easy and it takes effort, especially when it's an emotive issue for one but not the other.

For example, I've been talking to my partner on and off about all the trans stuff for almost a year. He gets some issues but not others. He can appreciate some aspects but still feels others are maybe hyperbole. I try not to go on and on about it and sometimes things get a bit heated. We haven't fallen out or anything major but he does get frustrated and annoyed at times so I remind myself to reign it in if I'm rabbiting on about it too often.
Slowly though, he is coming round. I've not pressured or forced him or tried to insist he's wrong and I'm right. He might occasionally say things that sound a bit ignorant or sexist or misogynistic but I don't label him as an irredeemable monster. Over time, he has started to listen or watch videos on the topic on his own. The sporting stuff has resonated with him. He is sometimes the one to point out to me 'hey I saw this article in the news' and then we might have a short chat about it. I encourage him to express his views and I try not to be judgemental if he doesn't have the exact or perfect response I was hoping for. When I showed him some of the prison stats some weeks ago that seemed quite a lightbulb moment for him. I think he's slowly starting to understand and appreciate the different strands of the debate. Of course the crucial bit is that even if we don't agree on everything, he is still encouraging and supportive of me going to events.
There has to be mutual respect for each other even if we might have to agree to disagree on some points. Most people simply haven't spent much time thinking about trans ideology or the gender pay gap or whatever. They have more important things going on in their lives and these topics aren't high on their list of priorities. It's different if you take an active interest in it and have been following all the research and reading up on the arguments. Other people simply don't have the time or inclination to do this.

Here's another link for him to read OP:
www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/business/2018/jul/11/tesco-faces-4bn-equal-pay-bill-as-claimant-numbers-swell-to-1000

nonny but he is wrong. It's not an alternative viewpoint it's an incorrect one and there is plenty of evidence to demonstrate this.
Some of your points are valid. There are so many issues at play here.

The fact is, womens participation in the labour market is restricted and unequal. Women are under utilising their talents, they're underrepresented in a number of fields and sectors and they still tend to take on the majority of childcare.

There is some research that shows that when young people start to consider which carers might interest them the first thing they do is reject jobs which aren't suitable to their sex. This is because children as young as 5 have already started to 'sex type' occupations.

It's a very complex area to look at but one thing is simple - the OP's husband is wrong.

CosmoK - Yes, but people don't magically change their viewpoint simply by being told they are wrong.
There are issues that feminists get tetchy about as well when told that factual evidence might be thin or contentious because it could undermine certain deeply held ideas in feminist circles. It's a human response.

The OP isn't going to change her partner's mind overnight. And shouting matches are unproductive. There's good resources posted in this thread so hopefully they can have productive conversations and he might gain a better understanding of the angle she's coming from.
It's possible that overall he's an arsehole and he might think it's ok that women are systemically disadvantaged, but as I said most people don't spend much time thinking about these issues and will watch or read snippets and come to some position that they then cling on to because arguments are viewed through this 'I'm right and you're wrong' prism so each side is unwilling to cave in and be viewed as the loser.

There are something that are worthy of the right/wrong debate and this is one of them.
I'm not willing to pander to people unwilling to see what is clearly evident.

It's structural. Do (mostly) women choose to take leave/work flexibly/prioritise and take on more of the domestic work because it's important to them, because social structures expect it of them, because men don't, because pregnancy and childbirth mean they get left behind their male peers anyway because companies won't/don't hire or promote them (how would a 6 month gap several times affect your dh work prospects).

He's an idiot!!

I'm currently battling to return to work from maternity leave in the same position as before, they're doing everything in their power to demote me.

Along side the usual questions regarding my return to work, they've asked what my future plans are for have another baby. They see pregnancy/maternity leave as a huge inconvenience for this particular role in comparison to other 'lower' roles in the company.

When our last gender pay gap report was issued, the gap percentage was substantially higher than the national average, I questioned this and was told it was because the higher earning roles attract more men than women. I didn't question this, as a childless woman at the time, I'd never felt discriminated for my sex. I now realise how wrong I was to believe them.

I believe your partner is right that there is very little to no gap for younger women, however once a woman becomes a mother, things change dramatically. Most women become mothers in their 20s/30s, yet we'll be working until our late 60s, possibly even into our 70s. That a huge amount of time to be disadvantaged in the workplace.

Yes, what people like sociology teacher telling 16 year olds that pay gap is a myth don't factor in is that The Family is an economic unit and within that unit, unfortunately, because of all the other factors it makes some sense for the woman to be the one who takes the hit. She mightn't want to, but she ends up doing that anyway, with reservations.

@midcenturylegs I like the way you handled that. Most women are crippled financially by the step back they've already taken, but if they were able to walk back in to a job that paid well enough to run a household, then more freedom is what they should push for. I type this but in reality I left with NOTHING and was 100% responsible for two kids and had no maintenance either! But I agree with you in theory absolutely. Didn't work out for me.

@readysteadybaby yes, until employers are looking at the men on your team and asking them what their plans are wrt a second child, then women are paying the price for maintaining the population......

I didn’t believe in the gender pay gap....

Women were just not pushy or ambitious enough to get what they wanted.

Then had a baby. Took minimal Maternity leave, then went back to work with DH as SAHD.

O,how I,laughed.

I have watched deeply mediocre males slide effortlessly up the promotion ladder. Whilst, me and a small group of women, all more motivated, better experienced and considerably better qualified watched our careers inexplicably stall. (This is in a very technical professional Job, so the qualifications should really mean something). Those of us who did push for advancement were seen as agressive, uncooperative ball—breakers.

Im cross, and getting crosser. and what makes me livid is i am watching, powerless as it happens to our next generation, our incoming apprentices. 2 unmotivated and mediocre males have now been promoted, the 3 women have not (all of whom are ambitious competent AND better qualified)

I darent think how much cold hard cash I have missed out on, just by not being called John.

Some of it is about the choices that women make, but they aren't necessarily the choices we want to make. I "chose" to step down from an executive job to be around more for my DD, but that was not my first choice of what I wanted to happen - I wanted to share parenting equally with XP (I was earning more when we met) but he opted out, as many men do, so my choice was then does DD rarely get to see either of her parents and miss out on after-school stuff, or do I give up my full time management role to give her a better life. I now have my own business so haven't suffered income-wise (though lack of employers pension provision or sick leave are a bit of an issue) but it's bloody hard work and I get little downtime.

Men taking more responsibility for parenting and jobs being organised more flexibly would help with that. I was listening to a researcher talk about this the other day, and she said in Sweden having time to spend with your family is seen as a right and work is organised accordingly, whereas in other places she'd researched (Italy and the US) it's seen as a privilege, making it more difficult.

Mucky1
I think you're getting a bit if a hard time on here with the "LTB" comments etc

There have been some brilliant links provided, so I advise send them to his WhatsApp or whatever, to read himself.

Unfortunately blokes with this opinion are common. They're everywhere. I even, yes had a child with one. He is intelligent, kind, funny, brilliant, but on the subject of feminism he just glazes over.

After about 7 years of living with him, so around now, he's finally got it! He really has. But the expect every man to "get it" especially when there is so much misinformation about feminist "myths" out there, is a lot to expect.

I am at the PP who's son was told pat gap is a myth. That's such dangerous misogynistic thing to say to a teenager.

Some of this comes down to language, what people are thinking when they think "pay gap". For many people they are mainly thinking about men and women paid at different rates for identical work, but that represents probably the smallest element, and what's more it's not terribly common a problem among waged employees, it tends to come into play in individually negotiated well paid positions.

The rest of it is complex, from who takes time off, who breastfeed, what kinds of careers people go into. Even things like differences in jobs that are considered the same skill level, someone upthread mentioned that warehouse workers need to be stronger than shop floor workers but the skill level is the same - but things like strength, risk of injury, do play into salary for obvious reasons.

Opinions on which of these things are important, and how to deal with them, whether we should even try to make them even, not everyone agrees on those questions, even among people who consider themselves feminists. So that is a huge area in which it is difficult to say there is a simple right or wrong answer.

My ex had the same beliefs. Misogyny is so unattractive.