Gender Politics in the US

In the United States, gender inequality has been diminishing with decades and centuries, Americans have made advancements towards gender equality. Gender equality dates back to the 1900s. In the current state, gender inequality still exists in the United States. The common forms of gender inequality in the United States is attached to the unequal political representation of women, unequal participation of women in politics, gaps in the gender pay, occupational segregation and in household labor that is unequally distributed among men and women. This paper focus at gender pay gap in the United States among men and women.

Surveys have indicated that gender pay gap is also known as gender income difference, gender wage gap, gender gap in earnings, male-female income difference or gender earnings gap. OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) argues that gender pay gap is calculated by analyzing the earnings of male and the earnings of women, the difference is then calculated as the percentage of the earnings of males. There are a number of causes that facilitate gender pay gap identifying by the positions in the workplaces held by men as compared to women, the specific nature of jobs engaged by men, differences in work experience attached to men as opposed to women and the breaks in employment between men and women among other factors (Gallagher par. 8).

In the United States, gender pay gap has generated constant debates as to whether the practice can be considered as discrimination or not a form of discrimination. Social pressure among the American community is forcing men and women make certain choices that influence the gender pay gap. Median wages of men’s wages and the women’s wages can also be used in determining gender pay gap; the challenge with this method is attached to the assumption of the fundamental variables that influence pay between men and women (Gallagher par. 13). Men in most cases work more hours than women and chooses places of work with high average pay, under this context, the issue of discrimination is overshadowed by the personal choices made by men and women.

Statistics compiled in 2009 indicated that female to male earnings in the United States was at 0.77. The gender pay gap in 2012 and 2013 has not significantly changed as the changes are attributed to the workplace and personal differences attached to both men and women in the society. Some of the common variables identified by occupation, level of education and the number of hours worked, among other variables (Gallagher par. 15). The American market in the current context is characterized with indirect discrimination of women, a factor that is significantly contributing to the gender pay gap in the labor market. Common indirect discrimination in the labor market identify with customer bias, employer bias and gender stereotypes in a number of professions among other factors.

Gender pay gaps in the United States currently stand at five percent to seven percent, acting as the discriminatory component. Some researchers argue that men and women would be subjected to equal pay if they got involved in same choices and if the society allowed open labor market (Gallagher par. 11), a factor that is contributing to hard time for today’s young women in calling attention and in identifying different forms of discrimination.

Researchers and scholars argue that different studies done in the United States labor market contained unequal pay between men and women, some of the researchers argues that the differences is outright discrimination, while some researchers argues that there is a need of including other variables while making such critical decisions.

Work Cited

Gallagher, Shaun. Mind The Male/Female Income Gap, But Don’t Exaggerate It. 12 May 2012. 05 December 2013 <http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/05/21/mind-the-malefemale-income-gap-but-dont-exaggerate-it/>.