Actually, it's only a problem because males dominate high paying industries.
There's a lot of talk about gender transitions on jobs. One common argument is if men leave jobs as they begin to pay less or is it that as more women take to a job, we value the job less.
Outside of a few niche industries (modeling, porn, etc...), men generally are in higher paying industries. And gender transitions within industries tend to favor men (for whatever reason).
I don't expect men and women to participate equally in every field of employment. But it would be interesting to understand why women aren't represented as highly in some of the higher paying fields, especially since the opposite is almost never the case (women are over-represented in a high paying field).
And low paying, dirty, dangerous industries too - and no industries at all, the majority of the homeless and the prison population are men!
This is the nasty little secret at the heart of feminism - they only want advantages, not equality. Another thing feminists are very quiet about is the earlier retirement age...
Thia is not strictly true. For a couple of reasons:
1) Men have systematically blocked women from being a part of some dirty dangerous industries. For example combat soldiers, firefighters, even fishermen. It's possible women may not be particularly good at these jobs, artificial boundaries certainly don't help your case.
2) There are other low paying industries dominated by women. For example pimped out prostitutes are predominately women. So again, there are basically no high paying professions dominated by women. And low paying professions are shared by men and women.
Homelessness and prisoner isn't a profession. It's a state of life. But a more fair comparison there is to something like domestic abuse leading to death at the hands of the opposite sex. Or rape at the hands of the opposite sex. Or even just murder at the hands of the opposite sex.
Women tend to be blocked from firefighting by the fitness test. Requirements like carrying a 80kg 100 yards, extending a ladder and running quickly were too hard for many women.
Fortunately, this problem is being solved in progressive countries - they are making the test easier.
This isn't great for me - I weigh more than 80kg, so I run the risk of getting stuck with a firefighter who can't carry me out of a burning building. But hey, gender equality is great, right?
This isn't great for me - I weigh more than 80kg, so I run the risk of getting stuck with a firefighter who can't carry me out of a burning building. But hey, gender equality is great, right?
Women were kept out period until relatively recently. I don't agree with reducing the physical exam if it puts lives in danger. I don't think we should block women from being able to even apply simply because we think the mass majority couldn't pass the test. At the same time we shouldn't create physical exams that have nothing to do with the job, knowing it excludes most women.
I guess it depends on what you mean by "recently" - in this case, it means 12-16 years before any current firefighter trainee was even born. (Assuming cadets are age 18-22.)
I agree with you that we should allow women to take the test, but we shouldn't lower standards to allow them to pass.
This isn't about high positions. This is about choice of profession. I can buy your argument for why men become CxOs (although based on people I've worked with in the past who have said they'd never report to a woman, I think sexism plays a large role in our industry), it doesn't explain why women as a whole go into poorer paying fields.
Psychology is the classic example. Few women in the field in the 60s, and pay was relatively good. By the late 90s it became dominated by women and the pay dropped signficantly. Did women go into because the pay was low, or did the pay drop when women went into it? You can find people who argue either side.
But the point is, there's never been an industry that women have gone into that has become a high paying field.
The best way for your son to be a financial success is to not go into whatever his sister is going into. :-)
More likely the pay for psychologists dropped because the total supply of psychologists (both genders) increased faster than the population. Also the psychopharmacology industry has provided an alternative to psychologists.
