“You can see that the pay gap isn’t as much about being a woman as it is about being a mom.”

A thread about the #genderwagegap with links for your weekend perusing

1st, check out the @netflix & @voxdotcom documentary below:

1/x
I’ve posted on this topic previously but it pisses me off enough that it requires re-tweeting.

Think about this: current data show that on avg U.S. women earn 81 cents of every dollar that a man earns. However, childless women earn 96 cents to a man’s dollar.

2/x https://twitter.com/bfry04/status/998264901020856320
As @HillaryClinton mentions in the documentary above, an old 1980s advice column brings up biases that still ring true today:

“If you’re a man & you have a family, plaster your office with family pictures, because people will think you’re a very good provider.”

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The column then says, “if you’re a woman & you have children, don’t put up pictures in your office of your family because people will think you can’t keep your mind on work.”

This issue is rooted in gender stereotypes & “traditional norms” that are very much still alive

4/x
Moreover, these phemomena affect opposite ends of the socioeconomic spectrum differently: the fatherhood bonus is lowest for the most disadvantaged men & the motherhood penalty is highest for the most disadvantaged women

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In other words, the poorest heterosexual partners have the largest combined wage discrepancies when they have children, the very people who need that 💵 the most. Sounds incredibly American of us, doesn’t it?

7/x
Other countries may provide some guidance. After 1994, Civil War & genocide left the Rwandan population ~60-70% women. They stepped into many previously 🚹dominated fields out of necessity, like military & politics. Rebuilding Rwanda required new policies that supported 🚺

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In Rwanda today:
➡️61% of seats in Parliament are held by women, highest in the world
➡️Women are just as likely as men to work outside the home
➡️They have a Gender Monitoring Office to enforce public programs compliance with constitutional goals of #genderequality

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A quote from the video:

“A young girl in Rwanda does not think that there is anything she’s not allowed to do. They don’t have to grow in a system where they think there will be a ceiling somewhere.”

Can we say the same in 🇺🇸?

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In a country where countless women are asked in job interviews about when they want to have kids or told to freeze their eggs when pursuing time-intensive careers?

How many 🚺 have been told “don’t become *insert career* because you might want to have a family someday!”

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And know that despite Rwanda’s progress, the pay gap for women is still 86 cents on the dollar! Only an add’l 5 cents/dollar than the U.S.!

The issue is so much more complex than gender equity, although discrimination undoubtedly still plays a role the #genderwagegap

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What does create change?
1️⃣Visibility in previously male dominated fields (still waiting on a female 🇺🇸 president...)
2️⃣Policy changes aimed at promoting & enforcing workplace gender equity (*cough* we have 1 of the WORST maternity leave policies of industrialized nations)

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Policies can help support culture change. In Iceland, dads have a “use it or lose it” 3 months of guaranteed paternity leave, which will become 5 mos (for each parent + add’l 2 mos shared) in 2021. This allows dads to be early, integral caregivers & may shift expectations

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“Changing the expectation that women should be the ones to raise children will require another cultural shift. And in the view of many who work in this issue, that shift begins with men.”

That’s right men, it begins with us.

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I hope to be a dad some day & you better believe I’m taking all of my paternity leave. But I already question how I’ll keep responsibilities even semi-equal once I got back to work as a surgical resident, where work-life balance is inherently tipped towards work

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Regardless of culture change & equalization of parental responsibilities, the fact remains that women still don’t receive equal pay for equal work. And that is just absolutely, heinously wrong.

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To steal another @HillaryClinton quote:

“The wage gap is not just a woman’s issue. It’s a family issue. Women have every right to be mothers without being penalized at work.”

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So how about we work on changing those @AmBdSurg parental leave policies? Only 4 wks extra across 5 years or you have to make the time up at the end of residency? Tell me this doesn’t disproportionately affect female residents with children...

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http://www.absurgery.org/default.jsp?policygsleave
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