The anti-discriminatory laws have been in place for many years. We still see a lack of complete equality across the workforce front. Many cite the lack of top women executives, non-equivalent pay, and work type as the main focus points of discrimination. I think that we need to look further into the reasons why these issues may be continuing and what are the actions that need to take place.
One major problem that I see is time. While it seems like it has been a long time since the laws were put in place, they really have not been when you consider that they are trying to change the culture of the business world. Citing a Wikipedia article on gender discrimination, “In the United States in 1995, the Glass Ceiling Commission, a government-funded group, stated: "Over half of all Master’s degrees are now awarded to women, yet 95% of senior-level managers, of the top Fortune 1000 industrial and 500 service companies are men.” Currently, citing an article on workforce.com, “44 percent of promotions to senior management positions go to women, up from 12 percent in 1999.” The Wikipedia article showing that more women earn masters degrees than men is now being shown in the workforce. So at the time of the article it looked awful to have so many women earning masters degrees to only have five percent represented at the management level. Now as those women that earned masters degrees enter the workforce, they are rising to management level positions. It takes time for the culture to change, and if it wasn’t for feminist groups actively pushing the issue we would probably still be stuck at the 95% level.
Just like the previous citation states, there are more women getting higher education than men now. This will translate to higher employment numbers for women. Also, as more women are employed the higher the likelihood that they will “move up the ladder.” This will translate into higher wages and the narrowing of the wage gap.
Another issue contributing to the idea of the gender gap is women who do not engage in the taxable workforce. One of the most prominent reasons for women to stay out of work is the desire to be a stay-at-home mother, or to take a job that allows flexible work schedules for childcare. I know of many women who take jobs that earn substantially less than what they could conceivable earn, because the want the ability to have flexible hours so that they can focus on their children. This abundance of women that forgo higher paying jobs has a negative effect on the perception of the wage gap. I am not saying that it is wrong at all; I am simply trying to present some of the information that could be leading to a misrepresentation of the wage gap. Also, many of the women whom rely on their spouses income, actively participate in volunteer work. Much of this work is non-income despite the tremendous amount of hours of work. An example of this is my stepmother. Despite usually spending over 40 hours a week volunteering, she gets no income from it. So despite having a college degree and providing an immense value to the community, she is seen as a negative to the gender gap.
In summary, when looking at how long the male dominated culture has been in place, I feel the strides that have been made this quickly are tremendous. As many statistics show women will continue to become more equals in the workplace. Many of the current CEO’s were well into their careers before the anti-discriminatory laws were put into place. Also many of the women executives you see in power now came into the workplace directly after the laws were enacted. I believe we still have a long way to go to equality and more importantly the generally belief and acceptance of complete equality, but as a society we are well underway. The women currently entering the workforce have a great debt to the feminist that struggled so hard before them.
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