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Wittig, Michele Andrisin; Lowe, Rosemary Hays
doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.1989.tb02356.xpmid: N/A
During the last 25 years, the wage gap between men and women full‐time workers in the United States has commanded much attention. Comparable worth theory asserts that sex segregation in the workplace has unjustly depressed wages in female‐dominated jobs. Comparable worth policy is designed to eliminate pay differentials between male‐ and female‐dominated jobs for which the skill, effort, responsibility, and risk are equivalent. Social scientists have important contributions to make to public debate over the theory and practice of comparable worth. Social psychological theorists and labor economists provide models of wage determination. Industrial‐organizational psychologists and compensation administrators evaluate jobs for the purpose of setting pay and serve on management–labor negotiating teams. Measurement specialists use their skills to reduce bias in job evaluation. All these professionals sometimes serve as expert witnesses, assisting attorneys in their presentation of evidence in pay litigation. This journal issue examines the theory and the implementation of comparable worth from all these perspectives. The presentation acknowledges the importance of social structural factors that perpetuate discrimination in wages, and it aims to clarify the strengths and weaknesses of comparable worth as a tool for overcoming that discrimination.
doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.1989.tb02357.xpmid: N/A
Comparable worth is a necessary and feasible remedy for the systematic, sex‐related pay inequities found in most contemporary work organizations. It is necessary because discriminatory pay practices of the past were not fully addressed by equal employment opportunity legislation, and their effects have been perpetuated by conventional pay administration practices. It is feasible because it can be assessed and implemented simply, often using data already available, at a relatively small cost to the organization. Arguments against the necessity of comparable worth are based largely on academic studies of pay discrimination, which differ from comparable worth studies in their context, purpose, methods, and results. Arguments against the feasibility of comparable worth center on potential costs and technical criticisms of comparable worth pay policies, objections contradicted by the facts of actual comparable worth implementation.
doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.1989.tb02358.xpmid: N/A
Analysis of the California State Civil Service indicates that the salary structure established in the 1930s explicitly lowered salaries for female‐dominated job titles simply because these jobs were filled by women. Moreover, this wage structure continues to influence current wages, even while controlling for the wages paid by similar establishments. The stability of the wage structure results from the state's policy of maintaining the relative salary structure, despite conflicting market wages. As a result of maintaining this wage structure, female‐dominated jobs have been underpaid between $202‐$990 million in the period from 1973 to 1986.
Pinzler, Isabelle Katz; Ellis, Deborah
doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.1989.tb02359.xpmid: N/A
Federal law, as currently written, is theoretically capable of redressing widespread sex‐ and race‐based wage discrimination. However, courts are not now applying these laws in ways that will attain that goal. In legal terms, comparable worth does not describe a legal problem or a theory of liability. The problem is sex‐ and race‐based wage discrimination, and the theories of liability are classic employment discrimination theories. Comparable worth studies may be used as part of the proof that wage discrimination exists, and wages based upon the comparable worth of jobs may be ordered as a remedy if plaintiffs prove discrimination. This article discusses several ways to close the gap between courts' current approach and the law's potential to change wage inequities.
doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.1989.tb02360.xpmid: N/A
Most economists believe the free market results in wage rates that are efficient and fair. Consequently, they oppose comparable worth proposals, which would require wage rates different from those the market has ordained. These views derive from economic models that ignore or deny the importance of social and psychological factors that lead to discrimination against women, and hence to a market that produces an unfair and distorted result. Comparable worth reforms would produce wage rates closer to those dictated by a nondiscriminatory market in which human capital is the main determinant of wages. Thus comparable worth could well improve the labor market rather than distort it. The experience of Australia suggests that predictions of widespread dislocations would prove false.
doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.1989.tb02361.xpmid: N/A
What degree of equality or inequality between work and wages is fair? This paper examines wage‐setting policies as different conceptualizations of fairness. Focusing particularly on comparable worth as an alternative to existing wage‐setting policies, it demonstrates how social psychological approaches to justice contribute to the understanding of these policies. More specifically, it analyzes the contributions of research on distributive justice and procedural justice to understanding the determination of job worth and the dynamics of implementing comparable worth policy. The discussion illuminates theoretical issues regarding the nature of the relationship between individual deservingness, social fairness, and social power. Finally, suggestions are offered for future research that links policy with basic theoretical problems.
doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.1989.tb02362.xpmid: N/A
This article addresses the role of comparison processes in the persistence of the gender wage gap, its toleration by those most disadvantaged by it, and resistance to comparable worth as a corrective strategy. It proposes that the gender segregation of jobs and the underpayment of women and women's jobs lead women and men to use different comparison standards when evaluating what they are entitled to receive in terms of pay for work. I argue that gender differences in entitlement contribute to toleration of injustice among underpaid female workers, foster cultural beliefs regarding what is appropriate pay for male and female workers, and serve as sources of potential bias in job evaluation plans. In addition, a variety of structural, cognitive, and affective factors encourage individuals to compare within groups, to regard ingroup members as the most relevant and legitimate comparative referents, and to inhibit the outgroup comparisons that lie at the heart of the comparable worth strategy.
doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.1989.tb02363.xpmid: N/A
Research on gender and pay satisfaction indicates that women are equally satisfied with less pay than men receive—the paradox of the contented working woman. Relative deprivation theory provides a framework for understanding how women's paradoxical contentment may contribute to the gender wage gap: Women may be content because they do not perceive a discrepancy between the pay they “want” and the pay they receive. A review of research on gender and the value of pay, and on gender and pay expectations, indicates that a value‐based explanation is needed to account for women's paradoxical contentment with their low pay. Research is described testing the hypothesis that gender differences in the meaning of money influence the value of pay and pay satisfaction, and a preliminary model of pay satisfaction is offered that integrates value‐based and comparative‐referent explanations of the paradoxically contented woman worker. Implications of gender differences in the value of pay for the issue of comparable worth are discussed.
Greig, Jeffrey J.; Orazem, Peter F.; Mattila, J. Peter
doi: 10.1111/j.1540-4560.1989.tb02364.xpmid: N/A
This paper discusses various problems that may arise in a comparable worth pay analysis, as illustrated by experiences with comparable worth in Iowa and other states. These problems include the choice of the number and type of job factors, the method of assigning values to each job factor, the method of selecting factor weights, and political and other modifications made when a pay plan is implemented. Special attention is given to the role of market wages in setting wages in the context of an internal labor market and as part of the comparable worth pay analysis. The paper also analyzes the impact of interteam rater reliability on pay analysis and suggests a method for correcting for variation in reliability among the job factors.
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