Steve Chapman–an exceptional columnist–wrote this great article a while back debunking the myth that women get paid 75 cents on the dollar that men do because of discrimination.This is such pervasive myth (it was taught in my Sosc. class) that most people are quite sure it’s true.As Chapman points out,
Buried in the report [by the American Association of University Women’s Educational Foundation] is a startling admission: “After accounting for all factors known to affect wages, about one-quarter of the gap remains unexplained and may be attributed to discrimination” (my emphasis). Another way to put it is that three-quarters of the gap clearly has innocent causes — and that we actually don’t know whether discrimination accounts for the rest.
This falsehood of women being egregiously discriminated against in the workplace has been perpetuated for far too long–it’s time to finally put it to rest.
