Male Bio Students Underestimate Female Peers

[xeria]

You want to know about laws: in many states men are required to pay alimony for kids they can show , using DNA evidence , are not theirs. The women's lobby is powerful. Prison population is 90% + male, so are deaths on the job, etc. Office of women and girls in WH, but no office of men and boys. No need for women to register for selective service. It is certainly not a man's world.

oh my, how predictable. I will admit that the alimony on children that are not theirs is a new twist I haven't looked into, and if that is indeed true, then it should be fixed. Have you looked into the reason of WHY male prison population is so high, and how it intersects with race and class? Deaths on the job are because high risk jobs have been historically deemed men's work, and women were barred, and still highly discouraged and made unwelcome today. Office of women and girls because there has been historical discrimination against women... No need to register for selective service... hmmm maybe because until this last year women have been barred from military positions?

*Yawn*...

 

[WWGD]

Now you're just being disingenuous.
The studies sample is mostly women, the survey questions were worded very broadly, apparently with "have you ever heard of anyone being assaulted or harassed" being a question that determined a positive harassment/assault of the respondent, and it was conducted online.

Further, it appears from the "study" that women and men are both targeted in trainee status, with women more so. However, it appears men shoulder a larger percentage of the assaults and harassment as working professionals.

I also don't think this applies very well to the topic at hand. Harassment and assaults are hardly male dominated bias in the classroom (study was conducted in field exercises). I'm not surprised women are harassed (being told you were pretty was harassing, according to the study), or unfortunately assaulted more than men (assaulted in the study could vary from physical sexual harassment, to rape). This has little to do with intellectual bias though, and more to do with human biology.

Indeed, I have seen so many studies claiming to prove the existence of bias that use only or mostly self-reporting, i.e., if someone stated they felt harassed, then this is accepted prima facie, without questioning, as sure-fire proof of the existence of bias. Disingenuous.

 

[WWGD]

oh my, how predictable. I will admit that the alimony on children that are not theirs is a new twist I haven't looked into, and if that is indeed true, then it should be fixed. Have you looked into the reason of WHY male prison population is so high, and how it intersects with race and class? Deaths on the job are because high risk jobs have been historically deemed men's work, and women were barred, and still highly discouraged and made unwelcome today. Office of women and girls because there has been historical discrimination against women... No need to register for selective service... hmmm maybe because until this last year women have been barred from military positions?

*Yawn*...

Please don't condescend me, I think I have been respectful to you so far. And there is a difference in the length of sentences for the same crime. Just curious: if society and laws are geared towards protecting and giving systemic advantages to men, why do they feel the need to commit crimes at such a high rate?

And deaths on the job are because men are expected to take on dangerous jobs, in a (possibly misguided) effort to protect women; same for serving in wars. And, yes, there is a legitimate case to be made for race, but not for gender, in my view; crimes committed by minorities are penalized much more so than for whites. If there was a serious attempt to repress women, something of this sort could be done. But it is not.

 

[xeria]

Now you're just being disingenuous.
The studies sample is mostly women, the survey questions were worded very broadly, apparently with "have you ever heard of anyone being assaulted or harassed" being a question that determined a positive harassment/assault of the respondent, and it was conducted online.

Further, it appears from the "study" that women and men are both targeted in trainee status, with women more so. However, it appears men shoulder a larger percentage of the assaults and harassment as working professionals.

I also don't think this applies very well to the topic at hand. Harassment and assaults are hardly male dominated bias in the classroom (study was conducted in field exercises). I'm not surprised women are harassed (being told you were pretty was harassing, according to the study), or unfortunately assaulted more than men (assaulted in the study could vary from physical sexual harassment, to rape). This has little to do with intellectual bias though, and more to do with human biology.

Please post a direct quote of any time I have said that my personal experience should be taken as evidence, let alone believed by anyone here.

As for the study, I posted it as a response to WWGD's request for polls used in research, and by extension, your assertion that mass similarities in experience are not used as evidence/cant be used as evidence for discrimination. It was not to prove discrimination against women in stem. As for being told you're pretty, surely you can realize the difference. In what way does it have to do with biology -- I'm not sure I follow?

 

[WWGD]

. Have you looked into the reason of WHY male prison population is so high, and how it intersects with race and class?

.

If society and laws were geared towards giving a systemic advantage to men: why would so many men feel the need to commit crimes at such a high rate when they can so easily get their way? Why has the life expectancy of women been steadily climbing if women have been systematically abused and mistreated? Why do so many studies use self-reporting as an accepted method, where discrimination is deemed to exist if some women felt discriminated against? And, yes, minorities do have a disproportionately high rate of imprisonment, but the ratio of around 93:7 male-female remains.

 

[xeria]

Please don't condescend me, I think I have been respectful to you so far. And there is a difference in the length of sentences for the same crime. Just curious: if society and laws are geared towards protecting and giving systemic advantages to men, why do they feel the need to commit crimes at such a high rate?

And deaths on the job are because men are expected to take on dangerous jobs, in a (possibly misguided) effort to protect women; same for serving in wars. And, yes, there is a legitimate case to be made for race, but not for gender, in my view; crimes committed by minorities are penalized much more so than for whites. If there was a serious attempt to repress women, something of this sort could be done. But it is not.

This is where we get into how sexism affects men. You can google that and look more into it if you like. Lengths of sentences longer because women are viewed as weaker and less likely to be aggressive. Men expected to take dangerous jobs because women are deemed too weak and for making babies, not being people. Your assumption that if sexism was real it would be the same as racism is a bit ridiculous in my opinion. They have different histories and contexts, they may overlap in areas but are not the same.

EDIT: You should note that I have not claimed that the affects of sexism (against women) do not negatively affect men. I do have sympathy for the ways in which men are harmed, however, I don't think all places and times are to discuss that. I think that solving the issues of sexism will help everyone.

 

[Student100]

Please post a direct quote of any time I have said that my personal experience should be taken as evidence, let alone believed by anyone here.

Didn't you read my last post? Look at your own quotes!

As for the study, I posted it as a response to WWGD's request for polls used in research, and by extension, your assertion that mass similarities in experience are not used as evidence/cant be used as evidence for discrimination.

The study I also asked for? Since, you know, we like to have some evidence based discussions here - sometimes - and studies that people think are pro or contrary to the argument are posted?

It was not to prove discrimination against women in stem. As for being told you're pretty, surely you can realize the difference. In what way does it have to do with biology -- I'm not sure I follow?

What was it for then?

I recognize the difference, I tell women they look nice all the time, because that's something you do where I'm from. The study doesn't.

I don't follow either? Why post something you know has no bearing on the discussion? We're going around in circles here!

 

[WWGD]

This is where we get into how sexism affects men. You can google that and look more into it if you like. Lengths of sentences longer because women are viewed as weaker and less likely to be aggressive. Men expected to take dangerous jobs because women are deemed too weak and for making babies, not being people. Your assumption that if sexism was real it would be the same as racism is a bit ridiculous in my opinion. They have different histories and contexts, they may overlap in areas but are not the same.

That is just one possible interpretation for the reasons . And I am not arguing that if sexism was real it would be the same as racism. I am arguing that in race there was(is?) a systemic effort to keep a group down, which is non-existent with sexism.

 

[xeria]

@Student100 I reread the quotes and I remember my intentions when writing them, neither of these conclude that I meant for my own personal experiences to be taken even as truth.
I don't remember you asking for a specific study, only asking me if I have a poll ( and you asked this in response to me asking if you have ever heard of polls because they use anecdotal evidence)

As I stated, the poll was a poll about women's issues directed at WWGD's request.

Do you interrupt women at work to tell them how pretty they are when it is irrelevant and unprofessional and unwelcomed? because, yes, that is harassment.

I wanted to clear up why you think that the outcome of the study has to do with biology?

@WWGD Technically, yes, you are correct, it is one interpretation, but so is yours, and I disagree with the second part, so I'm not sure what else there is to be said.

 

[Bandersnatch]

From what I read, if I understood correctly, the reasonable causes (cases with merit) were less than 100/year within the dataset,

You did not understand correctly. Reasonable cause is a separate category from merit resolutions. These are not synonymous, nor is one a subset of the other. There is a definitions section provided, explaining what falls under what term.

In any case, the data shows that this practice, despite being illegal, remains a real and persistent problem in the US.

Just curious: are CEOs ignorant of this supposed difference in pay? If so, why don't they hire only women , have them do all the work at 77% of the cost
and then pocket the difference?

You're still arguing against the same stawman. The gap is a difference in median income. It's also only a 'supposed' one, if you're not curious enough to read the data: http://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?queryid=54751.

These data should be the starting points of any discussion on gender income inequality. What I see here is an effort to dismiss them as non-existent which does show that the discussion is not held to the same standards we'd normally apply on PF.

 

[WWGD]

You did not understand correctly. Reasonable cause is a separate category from merit resolutions. These are not synonymous, nor is one a subset of the other. There is a definitions section provided, explaining what falls under what term.

In any case, the data shows that this practice, despite being illegal, remains a real and persistent problem in the US.

.

But you did not reply: is this a problem restricted to women? How many men file similar suits? Still, 73 million women on the workforce, a relaitvely small number of lawsuits. How is this a persistent problem?

 

[WWGD]

You're still arguing against the same stawman. The gap is a difference in median income. It's also only a 'supposed' one, if you're not curious enough to read the data: http://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?queryid=54751.

These data should be the starting points of any discussion on gender income inequality. What I see here is an effort to dismiss them as non-existent which does show that the discussion is not held to the same standards we'd normally apply on PF.

Why should the median be the same if women tend to go into occupations offering less pay?What obstacles are there nowadays with all laws protecting women, to go into high-paying positions? And this is not a strawman in the sense that it is brought up as such by many women. It is not put out just by myself.

 

[Bandersnatch]

But you did not reply: is this a problem restricted to women? How many men file similar suits? Still, 73 million women on the workforce, a relaitvely small number of lawsuits. How is this a persistent problem?

From my armchair I can't find a single example of a case awarded to males, whereas cases awarded to females abound. It wouldn't be a contest if we tried matching these finds one for one. That should at least give you a pause before trying to dismiss it as affecting both genders equally.
Correct me if I misunderstand this bit - those are numbers of cases, not numbers of people. If a whole company is sued by its employees in an alliance, that's still just one case. Whether that is significant or not is a matter of where you draw the line, I suppose.

The point being, this practice exists. It's persistent because it keeps on existing. There are employers who think paying one gender less than the other for the same work is fine, whether due to them being ignorant of the law and thinking its a normal thing to do, or hoping not to be caught, which is admittedly not that easy in the Western culture of being tight-lipped about your paychecks.

Why should the median be the same if women tend to go into occupations offering less pay?What obstacles are there nowadays with all laws protecting women, to go into high-paying positions?

The obstacles are the gender biases in the society - which is what this whole discussion was about. The litigations example shows the regulated part. The unregulated part is in how the society makes somebody overlook a woman for a promotion, or hire a man in a position - because of the persistent perception that men are inherently more ambitious, competent, driven, reliable, resilient, risk-taking, competitive, etc. It's in how we tell our children one gender is better at maths and the other at humanities, or which jobs are lady-like and which are manly, or that boys need to get a career while girls need to look pretty. In how when a couple has a kid, it'll be predominantly the woman that sacrifices her career to raise it.

You may think that's normal, or desirable, or good because it was traditionally so (never a good metric for 'goodness', imo). But unless somebody shows me a study detailing physiological reasons for why being a female makes you want to work shitty jobs, I'll continue seeing that disparity as a stain on the egalitarian values of modern western societies.

And this is not a strawman in the sense that it is brought up as such by many women. It is not put out just by myself.

Yes it is a textbook strawman. You're trying to put into question the existence of gender wage gap by attacking an argument you've constructed yourself from some 'many women's' arguments.

 

[WWGD]

From my armchair I can't find a single example of a case awarded to males, whereas cases awarded to females abound. It wouldn't be a contest if we tried matching these finds one for one. That should at least give you a pause before trying to dismiss it as affecting both genders equally.
Correct me if I misunderstand this bit - those are numbers of cases, not numbers of people. If a whole company is sued by its employees in an alliance, that's still just one case. Whether that is significant or not is a matter of where you draw the line, I suppose.

The point being, this practice exists. It's persistent because it keeps on existing. There are employers who think paying one gender less than the other for the same work is fine, whether due to them being ignorant of the law and thinking its a normal thing to do, or hoping not to be caught, which is admittedly not that easy in the Western culture of being tight-lipped about your paychecks.The obstacles are the gender biases in the society - which is what this whole discussion was about. The litigations example shows the regulated part. The unregulated part is in how the society makes somebody overlook a woman for a promotion, or hire a man in a position - because of the persistent perception that men are inherently more ambitious, competent, driven, reliable, resilient, risk-taking, competitive, etc. It's in how we tell our children one gender is better at maths and the other at humanities, or which jobs are lady-like and which are manly, or that boys need to get a career while girls need to look pretty. In how when a couple has a kid, it'll be predominantly the woman that sacrifices her career to raise it.

You may think that's normal, or desirable, or good because it was traditionally so (never a good metric for 'goodness', imo). But unless somebody shows me a study detailing physiological reasons for why being a female makes you want to work shitty jobs, I'll continue seeing that disparity as a stain on the egalitarian values of modern western societies.Yes it is a textbook strawman. You're trying to put into question the existence of gender wage gap by attacking an argument you've constructed yourself from some 'many women's' arguments.

No, you clearly are making things up when claiming to know:
1) What arguments have I heard? How do you know what I have or not heard? Are you a mind reader, a psychic of some sort? Please don't accuse me of dishonesty without proof. How do you know what arguments I have and not heard? Pure fantasy on your part. How is that in terms of following PF standards: accusing me of being dishonest without proof.

2) The reason you cite for the difference in pay is, as of yet, pure speculation. In addition, you do not know how many people are covered by the cases at hand, nor do you offer any evidence for the reason you allege for the difference in pay, for the obstacles. Yes, if the number of cases covers few people, this weakens your case: if one person in 10,000 is paid unfairly that does not make a pattern.Pure speculation, yet you give yourself the freedom to accuse me of being dishonest. Maybe you should address your own lack of egalitarianism before taking on society's ills, you know, learn to keep your own room clean before giving directions to others on how to live their lives.

3) It is arrogant on your part to believe that just because you cannot find alternative explanations to those you believe for the difference in pay , that there are not any that can serve as better explanations. Your case is weak, and your standards are not up to par, so please stop chiding me for "not living up to PF standards" until you raise your own standards .

You are very typical in wanting to give yourself the right to display outrage , but you do not feel the obligation to do the full legwork and informing yourself.

 

[Student100]

The gap is a difference in median income. It's also only a 'supposed' one, if you're not curious enough to read the data: http://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?queryid=54751.

These data should be the starting points of any discussion on gender income inequality. What I see here is an effort to dismiss them as non-existent which does show that the discussion is not held to the same standards we'd normally apply on PF.

Lets talk about the problems with the data for a moment. First, it compares annual median male wage earnings to the median annual female wage earnings. This is a problem because it isn't adjusted to account for confounding factors, such as men working on average more hours than women, or men taking more physically demanding jobs that pay more - which account for a large chunk of the wage earning differences.

See this paper prepared for the Department of Labor on contract in 2009:

https://www.shrm.org/Advocacy/Issues/CivilRights/Documents/Gender Wage Gap Final Report.pdf

From the forward:

There are observable differences in the attributes of men and women that account for most of the wage gap. Statistical analysis that includes those variables has produced results that collectively account for between 65.1 and 76.4 percent of a raw gender wage gap of 20.4 percent, and thereby leave an adjusted gender wage gap that is between 4.8 and 7.1 percent. ...

Research also suggests that differences not incorporated into the model due to data limitations may account for part of the remaining gap. Specifically, CONSAD’s model and much of the literature, including the Bureau of Labor Statistics Highlights of Women’s Earnings, focus on wages rather than total compensation. Research indicates that women may value non-wage benefits more than men do, and as a result prefer to take a greater portion of their compensation in the form of health insurance and other fringe benefits.

Obviously CONSAD caveats their research by stating they didn't really have enough data to make firm conclusions, but this shows there exists a possible mechanism to explain the wage gap that doesn't depend on discrimination.

 

[WWGD]

Correct me if I misunderstand this bit - those are numbers of cases, not numbers of people. If a whole company is sued by its employees in an alliance, that's still just one case. Whether that is significant or not is a matter of where you draw the line, I suppose.

The point being, this practice exists. It's persistent because it keeps on existing. There are employers who think paying one gender less than the other for the same work is fine, whether due to them being ignorant of the law and thinking its a normal thing to do, or hoping not to be caught, which is admittedly not that easy in the Western culture of being tight-lipped about your paychecks.

You may think that's normal, or desirable, or good because it was traditionally so (never a good metric for 'goodness', imo). But unless somebody shows me a study detailing physiological reasons for why being a female makes you want to work shitty jobs, I'll continue seeing that disparity as a stain on the egalitarian values of modern western societies.Yes it is a textbook strawman. You're trying to put into question the existence of gender wage gap by attacking an argument you've constructed yourself from some 'many women's' arguments.

I don't think it is normal, because I don't believe it exists, despite your acussing me of lying (i.e., of using a strawman), without proof -- maybe the high standards you refer to when you stated _my_ post does not live up to these standards?:

I am making an estimate of women covered by the lawsuits covered in the link: http://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/statistics/enforcement/epa.cfm offered by Bandersnatch.

I am using the total benefits awarded (bottom of link) over 18 years, from FY1997 to FY2015 , totaling around $130,000,000

I am assuming a case with merit would award a woman , at the low end, around $2,500 ( a low-ball estimate, I think). Under this assumption, around 130,000,000/2,500=52,000 women have been awarded money damages for employment discrimination in 18 years. An estimate of the average number of women in labor force in those 10 years is 78 million (1) (Half the sum of amount of women in labor force in 1997, 2015 respectively). It comes down to: an average of 2,900 women/year out of 78,000,000 in the labor force being awarded ( at the assumed rate of $2500) compensation. Is this a significant result ( a more reasonable assumption, I think, of $10,000 awarded per case reduces the total to 725 year)? Now, Bandersnatch , maybe an average rate of one per 26,800 is an epidemic to you, but not to me. We would all love to live in a perfect world, but this rate does not seem so bad.

(1)http://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/cps/womenlaborforce_2013.pdf
I am taking this as the average since there are women both entering and leaving the workforce.

EDIT: BTW: This is the standard _you_ set for deciding the existence of inequality.

 

[Andy Resnick]

<snip>When women try to talk about our experiences or even suggest that there may be a bit of bias we get jumped.

But it's important to talk. My eyes were opened at my previous institution, I had more than a few discussions with senior female faculty who came up through the system in the 60s and 70s about their experiences. They told me things I could not believe- Department chairs telling them that they will not be considered for tenure because they are female, that females don't belong in the lab, etc. etc. Knowing their experiences helps me be more conscientious, because I simply was unaware of such practices- nobody has ever told me I would have to choose between career and family, for example.

[Edit:[ It's a (small) measure of progress those sentiments were quite normative then but considered reprehensible now.

Now I am in a position to do something positive- for example, reaching out to talented URMs in my classes that don't see any role models and suggesting career paths they may simply have never considered.

 

[WWGD]

But it's important to talk. My eyes were opened at my previous institution, I had more than a few discussions with senior female faculty who came up through the system in the 60s and 70s about their experiences. They told me things I could not believe- Department chairs telling them that they will not be considered for tenure because they are female, that females don't belong in the lab, etc. etc. Knowing their experiences.

Or their _perception_ maybe, at least partially? I am not saying that they were lying, but there is an element of subjectivity here that I don't see you addressing.

 

[Andy Resnick]

<snip>The obstacles are the gender biases in the society - which is what this whole discussion was about. The litigations example shows the regulated part. The unregulated part is in how the society makes somebody overlook a woman for a promotion, or hire a man in a position - because of the persistent perception that men are inherently more ambitious, competent, driven, reliable, resilient, risk-taking, competitive, etc. It's in how we tell our children one gender is better at maths and the other at humanities, or which jobs are lady-like and which are manly, or that boys need to get a career while girls need to look pretty. In how when a couple has a kid, it'll be predominantly the woman that sacrifices her career to raise it.

This is an excellent point- bias means more than irrationally undervaluing certain groups, it also means irrationally overvaluing certain groups. Specific behaviors are considered positive traits for some and negative for others, based on cultural expectations.

 

[Andy Resnick]

Or their _perception_ maybe, at least partially? I am not saying that they were lying, but there is an element of subjectivity here that I don't see you addressing.

You've made it abundantly clear in this thread that on this issue you suffer from confirmation bias.

 

[WWGD]

This is an excellent point- bias means more than irrationally undervaluing certain groups, it also means irrationally overvaluing certain groups. Specific behaviors are considered positive traits for some and negative for others, based on cultural expectations.

EDIT But he has so far not replied to my counter that he has not shown the existence of bias through _his_ link, as part of _his_ argument, _not_ mine. According to my analysis of his data, out of an average labor force of 78 million, 2900 women were deemed by the EEOC to have been underpaid This is a rate of around one woman in 27000 in the workforce, and the standard proposed _by Bandersnatch_ (not by myself). Now, do you not believe this is an accurate measure of inequality?

 

[WWGD]

You've made it abundantly clear in this thread that on this issue you suffer from confirmation bias.

How so? I have never conceded to this. I analyzed the claims made by Bandersnatch, an-- avowed believer in the existence of sex discrimination-- and did not agree, I offered a counter. How can you allege confirmation bias when I replied to an argument provided by someone who explicitly believes there is underpayment? If I had selected the evidence maybe you would be right, but I addressed evidence offered by someone who disagrees with me. How can that be a case of confirmation bias? EDIT: You, OTOH have never offered anything even close to evidence that can be assessed/tested in any way. EDIT2: I have made _explicit_ counters to Bandersnatch's claims. Now feel free to find mistakes in my reply to him,

 

[Student100]

You've made it abundantly clear in this thread that on this issue you suffer from confirmation bias.

I don't think that's limited to anyone person in this thread.

 

[Dr. Courtney]

But socially don't we have a responsibility to strive for a bias-free atmosphere in which to educate people?

I'm not sure I would be so broad with the responsibility. I would work harder to strive for the teachers and other system employees and practices to be bias free. Too much effort to remove all bias from the students themselves seems destined to remove students themselves from the process: it runs the risk of producing a disproportionate bias against biased students.

The educational process needs to welcome both unbiased and biased students.

 

[WWGD]

I'm not sure I would be so broad with the responsibility. I would work harder to strive for the teachers and other system employees and practices to be bias free. Too much effort to remove all bias from the students themselves seems destined to remove students themselves from the process: it runs the risk of producing a disproportionate bias against biased students.

The educational process needs to welcome both unbiased and biased students.

And I think it is technically very difficult to accurately identify these biases, i.e., to do studies in many settings, while controlling for necessary factors, etc. And many studies that purport to do that are not being rigorous/careful-enough.

 

[Tobias Funke]

Please do show me a study that shows that men and women get paid differently _ for the same work_.

I think you might be arguing against a straw man here, or recalling an argument with some rather misinformed opponent.

I'm a bit late, but there is still indeed an unexplained wage gap when trying to account for relevant factors, so I don't know if that opponent was so misinformed. Even anti-feminists recognize a wage gap:

Could the gender wage gap turn out to be zero? Probably not. The AAUW correctly notes that there is still evidence of residual bias against women in the workplace.

The straw man is exactly what you pointed out: that the difference between the average hourly wages of all women and all men in the whole country is entirely due to some malicious, conscious discrimination.

 

[WWGD]

I'm a bit late, but there is still indeed an unexplained wage gap when trying to account for relevant factors, so I don't know if that opponent was so misinformed. Even anti-feminists recognize a wage gap:
The straw man is exactly what you pointed out: that the difference between the average hourly wages of all women and all men in the whole country is entirely due to some malicious, conscious discrimination.

It cannot be _my_ strawman, because I never proposed this. I proposed that a man is more likely than a woman to work to absurd extremes , even to his detriment, because many segments attach value to a man based on their earning power. Women tend to be wiser in this respect and save some time for social activities because society does not value them for their earning power. Companies recognize this. If trhere was a gap in pay for the same work whether conscious or not, this would become known, and would be used; these CEOs and their payroll departments are not dimwits . Bandersnatch dishonestly accused me of purposefully distorting things and then disappeared after I questioned him on it.

Many studies conclude that it is difficult to explain gaps in net earnings; that certain women demographics (e.g., single, childless women in their 20's) out-earn men in the same demographics and that women may choose benefit packages over higher pay (1). But Bandernatch chooses to accuse me of lying based on this, while claiming that _my_ post does not live up to the standards of PF -- maybe baseless accusations of lyings do , n Bandernatch's view, live up to those standards.

(1)
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2015/jul/15/politifact-sheet-gender-pay-gap/

 

[Tobias Funke]

(1)
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2015/jul/15/politifact-sheet-gender-pay-gap/

Hey, you asked for evidence of a wage gap when controlling for other factors and I gave it to you. I also linked to similar evidence a while back when you asked for it. According to your own link,

The study by CONSAD Research Corp. took into account women being more likely to work part-time for lower pay, leave the labor force for children or elder care, and choose work that is "family friendly" with fuller benefit packages over higher pay. The study found that, when factoring in those variables, the gap narrows to between 93 cents and 95 cents on the dollar.
...

Still, a study by the American Association of University Women controlled for a number of factors, including college major, occupation, age, geographical region and hours worked, and found a persistent 7 percent wage gap between men and women a year after graduating college.

The report explored discrimination and reluctance among women to ask for raises as reasons for the remaining gap, though those factors are hard to measure.

 

[WWGD]

Hey, you asked for evidence of a wage gap when controlling for other factors and I gave it to you. I also linked to similar evidence a while back when you asked for it. According to your own link,

But there are demographics where women do better too, according to the same link. And the possibility of reluctance to ask for higher pay , or willingness to accept non-cash benefits instead of pay increases as explanatory variables.. Besides, the 5% that _may_ constitute the pay difference falls into the 5% margin of error. Hardly the clear cut case of discrimination that is often made.

 

[radium]

While the situation has gotten a lot better, gender bias is absolutely real. While I have been lucky in that I have had only positive experiences with faculty, many of my female peers have not been so fortunate and have felt that they have been bullied and belittled by male faculty. I know of recent situations where faculty have openly displayed and vocalized biases towards female students. However, this situation was taken very seriously and faculty members of both genders were very angry that the student was treated this way.

I will note that this has not occurred I am my current department which I feel makes a special effort to make female students feel welcome. This could be in part that we have many faculty members again of both genders who are very passionate about this issues and had a female department head for several years. I think it really does make a difference for women when they see that signature on their acceptance letters.

This brings me to another point. There are very few faculty members in many subfields of physics. Mine is probably one of the worst. However, there have been recent female hires who are absolutely top notch. A lot of men underestimate how important this is and how just one woman can change the environment and make female students more welcome.

However, I do think in many cases people need to be more patient for these changes to happen. For example, grad school admissions is holistic (and many factors that are important in predicting male performance do not seem to have as much of a correlation for women) and women who apply are more self selective. This makes it understandable that a higher percentage of women are admitted. In my undergrad, I would say for the past two years, of the five most qualified students in the physics major, two or three are women which is atleast two or three times the percentage of women in the major. The reason is probably that many women drop out and the ones who stay work even harder to feel appreciated. That being said, admitting too many women is very harmful as people assume that a lot of the women are not qualified. This assumption is happens for faculty, even though all for all of the hires I have seen, the woman is hired because they are among the most qualified candidates who cannot be distinguished from each other.

I have had bad experiences in undergrad with a few undergrads and grad students as well as one postdoc. I can't tell you how many times I have felt like I have been interrogated while discussing homework. There was one guy who was especially rude to me and did this until I broke and said I didn't know anything when I was actually right (I usually make sure of this before I talk for this reason). I experienced something less subtle when I was in a freshman lab (where I was the only woman). We had to finish the lab report during the lab and the student did not know what he was doing. I said that I knew how to do the specific take and asked if he could let me do it. He responded by calling me a very rude name.
I was also around some grad students who were making sexual comments about another undergrad. It was absolutely juvenile and repulsive behavior. I have been the only woman in three classes during undergrad. I was one of two in one of my grad school classes. Sometimes the other did not show up so I was literally in a classroom surrounded by around 20 guys. I have been out to dinner or lunch with research groups where I was the only woman. I was the only woman and undergrad in one of these groups. Everyone was very nice to me, but try to put yourself in my shoes. It takes a little time getting used to these things.

I do believe that a lot of gender bias is unconscious and occurs because of ignorance and/or insensitivity. For example, when male students make comments that make female students uncomfortable, I don't think it means they are intentionally doing so or are bad people. I persobally think that if they were more educated on why those comments are inappropriate, they would feel bad and change their behavior.