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| Thursday, June 07, 2007 |
| Harvard ’07 Men Make More |
 Today is graduation day at Harvard (Bill Gates is doing the commencement speech). This prompted me to take a look at the Harvard Crimson paper and this headline popped out at me: ’07 Men Make More
The paper conducted a survey and 901 seniors (55% of the graduating class) responded. The responses revealed that male graduating seniors will be making about $10,000 more than female graduates for starting salaries. But evidence of the gender gap emerged when seniors reported their first-year base salaries. About two-thirds of graduates who have jobs lined up disclosed those figures.
The gap between male and female wages is largest in the technology sector. The median male salary in that industry is $74,000, compared to $50,000 for females.
Within most sectors, the gender gap is actually quite narrow. In banking and consulting, the median salary for men and the median for women are identical.
But women are less likely to have jobs in high-paying sectors lined up post-graduation. You would think the gender pay inequality would not be so evident among graduates of a top ivy league school. This little finding in the article was also disturbing In a study of Carnegie Mellon business school graduates, Babcock found that 57 percent of men “asked for more”—while just 7 percent of women tried to negotiate. Labels: Income |
| posted by Boston Gal @ 12:17 PM *
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| 6 Comments: |
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Thank you for highlighting this very important topic. As a working mother whose own very smart, educated mother never got paid (or never got paid adequately for her work) I feel very strongly about making sure I get paid for my work. I feel strongly about this from having watched my own mother not do it for herself. I feel strongly about making sure I earn my own money and that I be compensated fairly. I also feel passionately about being a good example to my own children -- especially to my daughter. Sticking up for ourselves, asking for raises, being compensated fairly is so linked to teaching our children how to be financially responsible. Thanks.
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I think a little bit may have to do with the fact that men are more likely to lie about their income -- especially coming out of and Ivy League school.
No offense to the school, but many of my friends are Yale grads who claimed they had lined up 6 figure incomes fresh out of school with signing bonuses and all kinds of perks.
Let's just say... not one of them is *really* pulling in that much money. Either that, or everyone of them is extremely frugle -- which from our experiences growing up, I know they're not.
Not a hard rule by any means, but I do think the male's tendancy to exaggerate probably swayed the results some.
Just sayin... ;0)
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Brainy took the words out of my fingers -- I believe men would be more apt to lie on these surveys to inflate their income. I'm not saying there isn't a gender gap in pay... because I know there is, but there's a gender gap when it comes to ego, as well.
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I agree with Brainy. Also, I think woman go for the more interesting job, not necessarily the best paying. That's what I did. Out of school I had offers $10,000 apart. The highest also came with commisions.
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Why is it so hard to accept that even if there is no discrimation men will probably still earn more (on average) that women for the "same" job? There are biological differences that mean that men may seek wage rises, promotions etc. more vigorously than women (on average). There are also biological reasons why women tend to take more time off work for child rearing, which adversely impacts career path.
If men can accept that they live, on average, a few years less than women due to biological reasons, and not due to discimination against men in terms of heathcare etc., why is it that many women view any difference in incomes as evidence of ongoing discrimination? (I'm not denying that there was considerable entrenched discrimination in the past, just that even in the absence of any discrimination there may be a residual difference in typical wages).
Regards
http://enoughwealth.com
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Interesting study. The mere illimunation of this issue is a starting point.
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Thank you for highlighting this very important topic. As a working mother whose own very smart, educated mother never got paid (or never got paid adequately for her work) I feel very strongly about making sure I get paid for my work. I feel strongly about this from having watched my own mother not do it for herself. I feel strongly about making sure I earn my own money and that I be compensated fairly. I also feel passionately about being a good example to my own children -- especially to my daughter. Sticking up for ourselves, asking for raises, being compensated fairly is so linked to teaching our children how to be financially responsible. Thanks.