Wage gap stories usually begin with stat ickses showing that working men make more money than working women. Single straightforward, widely understanding. But dig a little deeper and everything lets more complicated. Comparing the very different jobs sometimes tough. Men and women of a similar age may have dissimilar numbers of working years because birth and child rearing falls differently. How do you fig it out . Melissa chan reports from san francisco. Reporter the law requires equal pay for equal work. And it will prohibit retallation against anyone who discloses and discusses his or her pay. We have pay laws on the books, but they are enough. Reporter equal rights advocates an organization that helped sponsor the bill. We represented women who clean hotel rooms, they are getting paid less than janitors who vacuum right outside the similar work. Reporter advocates say the new law will impact all industries and jobs from construction work to silicon valley. Some of these biggest pay disparities take place in the Cutting Technology word. This law is expected to change things, but how much . Success for women has still been measured by penny by penny increments. Last year women earned 7 cents for looking at the bottom, the poverty rate among women was 14. 7 , compared to 10. 9 of men. Critics of the New California law say it will mean more litigati litigation. Employees taking their bosses to court. But proponents disagree. Im sure a lot of people were concerned when the Civil Rights Act passed that there would be more litigation. But it was an important step in making sure that people gained rights. Reporter california is often ahead of the curve. That is certainly the hope of many advocates here who want to see new momentum in california d. C. With a proposed National Paycheck fairness act. Balancing wage scales. This time on the program. California is a super state, home to some 39 million people, one out of every eight americans, so it has a big say and influence over working conditions. Will it be a trend setter . Are wage scales for all kinds of jobs are going to catch up to womens changing roles and changing stature in the workplace. Joining us to talk about the New California law is Vice President of the National Partnership for women and families. Vicky does this law and the way it is written address what you see as the structural inequalities between working men and women. The California Law makes Great Strides in the direction towards equallizing pay scales. It recognizes substantially similar work. So men and woman are paid comparably, and creates a better ability of workers to know what they are being paid and to colleagues. When you go to your boss and say, look, i do pretty much the same work, but there is the key phrase, pretty much the same work as tim and i know he makes more money per hour. Who gets the final say . In the best case scenario, is the supervisor would consider what the man and woman are being paid and make a determination as to whether the women is being unde underpaid, ideally that is how it has worked out, in looking at whether there is explicit or implicit bias going on. If that doesnt work out there is opportunity for them to go to court. Under federal law and the California Law, it strengthens that even more. But what are you saying . That someone can then sue after they find out that this this gap exists for the same work. Couldnt they sue before . Before this law was passed . The law sets out a better standard. A more a more responsive standard to what women are facing in the workplace. And tightens up what is considered equal pay for equal work. So thats the real benefit. But here what this law will do and ultimately the paycheck fairness act would do is to create a culture for workers to find out what they are being paid and not be retaliated against, so were better able know whether people are being paid fairly, and employees themselves are able to make the case that they deserve to be treated equitably. In a mediumsized firm, where there are a small number of people doing a great many task, is it going to be a harder call than in a large enterprise where there are large numbers of people doing individual tasks. Where there is not classes of on . That may be true, and there will be businesses and consulting firms that crop up to really help develop best practices around this. Some of what the Obama Administration has done with respect to executive action is also to encourage employers to understood best practices and take a look at their pay scales, but its really about correcting that substantial pay disparity that effects working woman and the families that rely on them. And thats really what matters here when were thinking about closing that wage gap. When we say theres a wage gap, and its a common place observation in all of these stories, what accounts for that gap . Is it breaks in tenure . That are more frequent among employees. Or certain kinds of work, a combination, or just as rude and blunt and straightforward as if tom and jane are doing the same exact job, its likely jane is going to be paid less . The causes and the consequences of the pay gap are varied right. You have talked about things like education level. Things like break in tenure, choice of jobs, but if you look across every industry and every job virtually every occupation women are paid less than men among those who are working fulltime year around. So some of it can be explained by some of these different factors at play when you put all of women and all of men together, but some of it really just comes down to discrimination. Somewhere between 7 and 9 according to experts. So its not all discrimination, buddies krim nation is surely at play. Vicky, thank you a lot. Thanks for are having me. Differentiation between workers have been a motif in the modern workplace. The weakness of unions, the rise of the professional manager, have all played a role in the destandardization between workers. Balancing wage scales. Its the inside story. Puerto ricos debt crisis. Theyre gonna demonstrate right outside where the governor lives. Are hedge funds offering a fix . Those investments will spark the economic recovery. Or just fixing the odds . Theyre trying to force us into one course of action. Faultlines. What do we want . Al jazeera americas hardhitting. Today the will be arrested. Groundbreaking. Theyre firing canisters of gas at us. Emmy awardwinning, investigative series. Welcome back to inside story. Im ray suarez. As i have gone to College Commencements over the last 20 years, i have noticed something that has to play out in the coming decades. Women are outpacing men in completing college degrees. Many places they are running circles around graduating distinction. They are finishing high school at higher rates at well, and when demographic realities kick in, will that close the wage gap. Professor brians is this something that advises us to tread lightly; that some of this is going to be taken care of by what is happening in the job market itself . Well, its interesting that you bring up the change in College Completion that has taken place over the last 20 to 25 years. And it is true that women enroll in college and complete college at higher rates than they used to, and in comparison with men, more women complete college. Its not clear how this is going to ramify in terms of the gender pay gap especially in upper levels of management or the professions. This has been going on, actually for a couple of years, like i said. And we havent seen one of the things that we have noticed is that if you look at the Income Distribution, its precisely in the really wellpaying professions, the upper Income Distribution where you see the largest gap between men and women in their pay. And thats true today and was true 20 and 10 years ago. We would have expected more change over the last 20 years if it was simply a matter of womens education gaining ground with men. At the same time, its true there is a lot of turbulence in the labor market, and we have also observed a shift from manufacturing to the service sector, which has disadvantaged men. So the gender wage gap is a very complex product of what is going on with women. They are earning more relative to men. Procefessorepstein you wanted to get in there. First of all on these socalled studies about working women, you cant normalize it that way. She is not equal to the man. You cant normalize by ratios under this thing. The second point to make is you are looking at a completely different hiring force. People doing these hires know theres no explicit discrimination. There are all sorts of women in senior positions who have a lot to say about personnel. Theres also other ways of looking at this thing, which show there is a huge selection bias. One way to do this is not to look at the employment relationship, but the kinds of businesses that women and men set up when they go out on their own. And theres a huge gap in the kinds of businesses. Women are much more likely to be brokers, and men are much more likely to be developers. If these things sort by sex, why is this discrimination . Or if you look at law firms, by the time you get to the partnership level, its typically Something Like 85 15, or 80 20. That is a function of choices by the women. None of these studies try to take that into account. And the thought that you are going to be able to piece this out in the form of a class action litigation is just a pipe dream. California has already done very well in these particular regards, the women coming into the educational force is very high. If you look at layoffs in the last recession, men were hit harder, whether it was by occupation, age, or education. This is not a world in which there is discrimination against women. And this statute will take a situation that is relatively good worse. Quick response . Well, its not clear where to start. First of all again, im just going to go through some of the special trends that we know about. We know there has been really dramatic change over the last 20 years in the length of time without of work among women who bare a child. They have increased their education. Men are doing more child care than they once did. So the burdens that women traditionally once bore that were related to the gender pay differential have changed pretty dramatically. You would expect the wage gap to change in a way that corresponds with that. Seen. I want to thank my guests, richard epstein, and july brines. Ill be back in a moment with a final thought on work, men and women. Stay with us. Its inside story. And send us your thoughts on twitter, or follow me and get in touch. Or visit our Facebook Page and tell us what you think it will take for women to make as much or even more than men. I would love to hear it. Welcome back to inside story, im ray suarez. As i have gone to College Commencements over the last 20 years i noticed something that has to play out in the coming decades. The impact is unpredictability. In schools public and private, large and school. Women are outpacing men in completing college degrees. In many places they are running circles around men, graduating with distinctions. Finishing high school at higher rates as well, and when demographic realities sink in, will it be men who have the trouble commanding equal wages, if not, why not. Professor brian and epstein is with me. Is this something that advises us to dread lightly. Some of this is going to be taken care of by what is itself . Well, its interesting that you bring up the change in College Completions. That has taken place over the last 2025 years. And its true that women enrol in college and complete college at higher rates than they used to, and in comparison with men, more women complete college. Its not clear yet exactly how this will ram iffy in terms of the gender pay gap. Especially at upper levels of management of the profession. This has been going on, actually, for a couple of years, like i said, and we havent seen one of the things that weve noticed is that if you look at the Income Distribution, its in the really wellpaying discretions, ut upper deciles of the income, where you see the largest gaps between men and women in their pay. Its true today and was true 20 years ago. We would have expected more pay over the last 20 years if it was a matter of womens education gaining ground with men. Its true theres a lot of turbulence in the Labour Market and we observed a shift from manufacturing from the service sebbing tar which disadvantaged men. The gender wage gap is a complex product of what is going on with women. They are earning more relative to men. Professor epstein wanted to get in there . I had little time to speak, to put it mildly. Let me mention a couple of points, on the studies with working women, you cannot normalize that. The fact that a woman works, means its in the identical to a man. You cant normalize biratios under this thing. The second point to make about this is you are looking at a different higher velocity, people doing the higherings are aware of the situation. They know theres no explicit discrimination, theres women in positions that have a lot to say. Its not a question of us v them. Theres other ways of looking at this, showing theres a huge selection bias in the way workers want to take their positions one way or another. One way is not to look at employment relationships, but the businesses that women and men set up when they go out on their own. Theres a huge gap in businesses that women are likely to be focus the, and likely to be developers. One is high risk, high break down, the other can be turned out to be a lower list and highly paid. Why is this discrimination . If you look at law firms, women have 50 of the positions. By the time you get to partnership levels, its Something Like 8515, or 8020. Its not a does function by the firm. None of the studies referred to try to take the figure into account. They overstate the residual in these areas. The thought that youll piece this out in class action is a pipe dream. California has done well in the regards. The women coming into the educational force is hard. G you look at lay offs, men were hit harder, whether you did it by occupation, age, education, this is not a world in which discrimination against women, its a world of statistical disparity, it will take a situation that is good, making is worse than it is. Quick response. We have about 40 seconds left . Well its not clear where to start with all of this. First of all, again, im going to go through some of the social friends that we know about. Over the last 20 years we know that there has been dramatic change as a matter of fact in the length of time out of the work among women that bear children. That has changed. They increased education, men are doing more childcare than they once did. The burdens that women bore, that were related to the gender pay differential that professor epstein talked about changed dramatically. You expect it to change in a way that corresponds with that. I want to thank my guests, richard, Lawrence Epstein and julie brians, professor of sociology at the university of washington. Ill be back in a moment with a final thought an men, work and women. Stay with us. Send us your thoughts on twitter oo. M or follow me and visit our Facebook Page and follow what it will take for women to earn as much if not more than men. Wed love to hear it. Puerto ricos debt crisis. Theyre gonna demonstrate right outside where the governor lives. Are hedge funds offering a fix . Those investments will spark the economic recovery. Or just fixing the odds . Theyre trying to force us into one course of action. Faultlines. What do we want . Al jazeera americas hardhitting. Today the will be arrested. Groundbreaking. Theyre firing canisters of gas at us. 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