[the_grue]

Exactly. The word "peers" in the title implies comparison between people with a similar background (education, industry, etc). But it seems the actual study just compares the average salary of all single, young, childless women vs the average salary of all single, young, childless men across the economy.

[J-dawg]

So it's making exactly the same mistake as studies that compare the average salary of all working-age women with the average salary of all working-age men, and then declare a "gender pay gap" of 20% (or whatever).

[carlmr]

I was thinking the same. The study is stupid, but for the same reason any of the women's pay gap studies in the last few years fall short. Comparing apples and oranges is the new science.

[crusso]

Yep. In a world of such pervasive intellectual dishonesty, what's the best course of action? While I admire the people and arguments that have the most intellectual integrity, it seems that demagoguery just works better when it comes to shaping public policy.

At the end of the day, the problem is that most people (voters) wouldn't even begin to understand or appreciate the distinction between demagoguery and intellectual integrity.

[carlmr]

The best way around this is to have education. Especially on topics like statistics literacy (not really just statistics, but how to read them), journalism, lobbyism and propaganda. These things should be taught in high school. Taking apart arguments in old propaganda (where there is less political motive) and encouraging people to look out for new propaganda.

Of course it doesn't seem the government would be interested in having such an educated populace.

[J-dawg]

> The best way around this is to have education

I agree completely, but would education really fix the 20% gender pay gap myth?

I find it very difficult to believe that most of the people who continually reinforce this myth actually believe it to be true. They simply can't all be that ill-educated and/or stupid. And yet the same articles appear in the media every single year. It's become one of those taboo subjects where dogma trumps facts.

The worst part is that it stifles discussion of the earnings gap that actually does exist, and stops us from having meaningful conversations about society's expectations of both men and women.

[x220]

>I find it very difficult to believe that most of the people who continually reinforce this myth actually believe it to be true.

That is totally irrelevant to their decision process. People keep repeating these statistics because it's useful to make others believe that women are discriminated against in the workplace.

[ada1981]

Trump should just cite the studies that show it's not true, but present it as a NEW DEVELOPMENT and thus #MAGA and take credit for it.

[Reedx]

Statistics literacy would help, but there are a lot of highly educated people who repeat things like the pay gap myth. I think the problem is more about ideology and the lack of critical thought.

[the_grue]

If even PhD's can't be expected to adhere to basic standards of intellectual honesty and critical thinking, then how can we ever expect the general society to grow up and realize the value of these things? How can we, the enlightened few (I say this half-seriously, of course, because obviously I am not without fault myself), ever expect to be able to lead a logical conversation with most normal folks we encounter in our daily lives, even with our parents, spouses and children? Seriously, most of us will never be able to choose their spouse from that tiny minority that understands honest and logical discussion. They will have to settle for something less. Most of us will have children who will never understand what we understand, simply because the school, the society and even our spouses will teach them to act based on emotions and false values. Basically, we are doomed to be eternally dissatisfied with the way our lives turn out to be!

I have to admit, conversations about critical thought in society invariably make me depressed.

[PurpleBoxDragon]

It seems in this case we are comparing apples and apples for their ability to be made into orange juice.

[RHSeeger]

I would argue that the analysis of wages based on different groupings is worthwhile; as long as you don't try to predetermine what you're going to get out of them.

This analysis doesn't show us that woman make more given equal background/education/etc. However, it does provide the interesting information that women (of that age group) are generally better educated. If we take out of it the desire to find out why they're better educated (and ways we can balance it out), we're better off.

The same is true of studies that show women are paid less, but then the real reason (behind the results highlighted in that study) is that they tend to take lower paying jobs [1]. Sure, you can't take out of that "employers aren't paying them enough", but you can take out of it "why are women generally in the lower paying jobs?", and look for ways to change that fact.

[1] I'm not saying there is or is not a gender gap for equal jobs, just discussing the useful takeaways of studies that ignore the difference in jobs when analyzing the gender gap.

[fyi1183]

So on [1], there is an interesting question of cause and effect. Are women voluntarily taking inherently lower paid jobs on average? Or is it involuntary / due to social pressure? Or are certain jobs lower paid because they're predominantly taken by women?

The latter is at least a possibility.

[randomdata]

> If we take out of it the desire to find out why they're better educated (and ways we can balance it out), we're better off.

I would argue it is because female-dominated professions tend to have schooling requirements, by law. Male-dominated professions are less apt to.

Anecdotally speaking, I was able to start as a software developer, a male-dominated profession, when I was in high school and soon moved into doing it full time after that. As a result, I do not rank well when measured by my schooling. I later started farming and it did not require schooling either. Both jobs only required the desire to do them. In contrast, a female in my cohort interested in nursing, a female-dominated profession, would legally be prevented from doing so until completing many years of post-secondary schooling. And if that person wants to become a teacher, another female dominated career, later in life even more legal schooling requirements are necessary.

On the assumption that females have more schooling because they have to, in order to pursue the careers they want to do. Is the correction in easing the legal requirements for these jobs, or is the correction to enforce more stringent legal requirements on male-dominated jobs?

[UncleMeat]

> I would argue it is because female-dominated professions tend to have schooling requirements, by law. Male-dominated professions are less apt to.

And you would base this off what data? Surely we shouldnt just be using our guts here.

[randomdata]

> And you would base this off what data?

The data that shows that female-dominated professions are more apt to have legal requirements.

> Surely we shouldnt just be using our guts here.

Well, why not? We're not writing formal research papers here. Only writing comments for personal pleasure in our spare time.

[x220]

I think anyone, regardless of training or education, should be able to be a nurse. To say otherwise is sexism.