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Gender Inequity and Discrimination

Problem:  The gap between men's and women's salaries in the United States has widened during the period 1995-2000, according to a Recent study by the General Accounting Office. 

• "Full-time female managers earned on average less than their male counterparts in the 10 industries that employ 71 percent of all female workers, and in seven of the 10 fields, the pay difference widened."

• "The study found that a full-time female communications manager earned 86 cents for every dollar a male made in her industry in 1995.  In 2000, she made only 73 cents on the man's dollar. "

• The industries under study, included public administration; professional medical services; education; entertainment and recreation services; finance, insurance, and real estate; business and repair services; retail trade; and other professional services."

• Source: Henry, "Male-Female Salary Gap Growing, Study Says," Washington Post, January 24, 2002, A2.

Problem:  The gap between the opportunities afforded to men in business and those afforded to women is not limited to salary differential.  That gap exists in a range of other opportunities, as well.

• The Committee of 200, a network of leading women entrepreneurs and corporate leaders, has created the C200 Business Leadership Index.  This index measures "the progress of women compared with men" in 10 areas of business opportunity.  A score of 10 indicates parity.  Interestingly, the highest of the 10 scores, 7.6, "is for women's earnings compared with men's. . . . [Despite the fact that] "equal pay for equal work has been a goal of public policy for decades . . . it will take 30 more years to reach parity at the current pace of progress."  Source:  Gutner, "Progress? Not as Much as You Thought," Business Week, February 18, 2002, p. 108, reporting on The Committee of 200 Annual Report on Women's Clout in Business, which relies on U.S. Census and other public and private data bases for its analysis.

• "With 10 equaling parity with men, the overall index number was a mere 3.95." Id.  

• The other elements of the index include MBA enrollment (6.60), business ownership (5.88), corporate officers (2.78), corporate board seats (2.66), venture-capital funding (1.10), and charity fund-raising chairs among the top 30 U.S. charities (0.00).  Id. 

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