Society/Culture The Gender Pay Gap

[twotooto]

Not all roles suit a flexible arrangement; not all employees are willing (or able) to sacrifice hours worked for more flexibility.

Again; the concept works at a macro level, but for significant portions of the population, is not realistic given the current expectations and role of work (and earnings) in our lives.

Would you say that, amongst your arsenal of punctuational tools, the semi-colon is your favourite?

 

[owen87]

Would you say that, amongst your arsenal of punctuational tools, the semi-colon is your favourite?

It is actually; that or the em dash.

 

[medusala]

And on it goes.

https://news.sky.com/story/mandator...-a-fairer-and-more-diverse-workforce-11523177

Businesses could be forced to reveal their ethnicity pay gap after an audit last year showed significant disparities in pay and promotion opportunities of different ethnic groups .

 

[medusala]

Flexible working is only applicable for office jobs.

Bomber Thompson disagrees.

 

[freddy mercury]

I've personally never been in a job where one person, man, woman or beast doing the same job earns more or less than somebody else.

 

[the_interloper]

I've personally never been in a job where one person, man, woman or beast doing the same job earns more or less than somebody else.

So this means you knew what everyone was earning?

 

[jatz14]

So this means you knew what everyone was earning?

In many places, there are set tiers based on experience, and no real room to negotiate anything different. So, even if you do not 'know' officially what people are working, you know what tier they will be, and therefore what they will be getting paid.

Thats the case at my workplace, both my female co-workers will have maxed out the tiers, so that will be their pay rate. Any male thats maxed them out will be on the same pay.

 

[the_interloper]

In many places, there are set tiers based on experience, and no real room to negotiate anything different. So, even if you do not 'know' officially what people are working, you know what tier they will be, and therefore what they will be getting paid.

Thats the case at my workplace, both my female co-workers will have maxed out the tiers, so that will be their pay rate. Any male thats maxed them out will be on the same pay.

Fair enough, I haven't really worked at a place like that. I work at a medium sized local business and would have no idea what everyone else is on, nor should I really.

 

[Seeds]

Fair enough, I haven't really worked at a place like that. I work at a medium sized local business and would have no idea what everyone else is on, nor should I really.

yes you should know what others are paid. Workers needs to speak out about their wages. Its the only way we end up with equal pay rates for equal work.

companies dont want you to speak out as they know they will be able to dud some people with low pay if they keep wages a secret.

 

[Taylor]

yes you should know what others are paid. Workers needs to speak out about their wages. Its the only way we end up with equal pay rates for equal work.

companies dont want you to speak out as they know they will be able to dud some people with low pay if they keep wages a secret.

What do we do about the inefficient but equally loud and jealous voices of people who are never able to comprehend that others work better than them and therefore deserve to be paid more?

Or imagine if you're earning less than the person you're always helping out because they can't keep up with their workload.

Great way to create a bad atmosphere at work, although I agree that everyone knowing what everyone earns will make for a better environment for everyone to be paid what they are worth.

 

[Seeds]

What do we do about the inefficient but equally loud and jealous voices of people who are never able to comprehend that others work better than them and therefore deserve to be paid more?

Or imagine if you're earning less than the person you're always helping out because they can't keep up with their workload.

Great way to create a bad atmosphere at work, although I agree that everyone knowing what everyone earns will make for a better environment for everyone to be paid what they are worth.

They just have to suck it up. If they believe they are worth more they will go look elsewhere. Eventually they will have their wake up call when no one wants to pay them more.

 

[the_interloper]

yes you should know what others are paid. Workers needs to speak out about their wages. Its the only way we end up with equal pay rates for equal work.

companies dont want you to speak out as they know they will be able to dud some people with low pay if they keep wages a secret.

Yeah I get that argument, I don’t know, I feel awkward knowing what everyone else is paid.

I work in sales anyway, I don’t reckon anyone in my sort of role gets the exact same. Your value is skewed by if you have a degree, how much experience, technical background etc etc

 

[Taylor]

Yeah I get that argument, I don’t know, I feel awkward knowing what everyone else is paid.

I work in sales anyway, I don’t reckon anyone in my sort of role gets the exact same. Your value is skewed by if you have a degree, how much experience, technical background etc etc

Your position "should" reward you on performance given the direct link you have to company success.

Marketing
Sales
Delivery

Tick, tick, tick = profit and without any of those three the rest is worthless - so I can see why a company would want everyone on salary and not performance bonuses.

 

[kickazz]

I read somewhere that overall, employees are better off knowing what everyone gets, employers are better off keeping it secret.

I do remember one place I worked there was someone who was ok but not a great employee who I found out was right at the top pay bracket for their grade. They once conspicuously left a print out of their performance review on their desk (on purpose). A key summary from their manager said something along the lines of "should work harder at being a good team player and complain about pay less".

Everyone knowing would surely shake things up a bit.

 

[the_interloper]

Your position "should" reward you on performance given the direct link you have to company success.

Marketing
Sales
Delivery

Tick, tick, tick = profit and without any of those three the rest is worthless - so I can see why a company would want everyone on salary and not performance bonuses.

I've been in sales teams before which have had individual targets and bonuses paid on revenue figures accordingly. It actually creates internal competition and restricts the flow of information between team members, basically they won't work together. Maybe it works for some industries but not in mine from what I can tell.

My current role we have a national target and a team bonus, as a result we work toghter much better than what I've experienced in the past.

Slight side track but I was just at a customer lunch where we discussed exactly this topic.

 

[Gethelred]

What do we do about the inefficient but equally loud and jealous voices of people who are never able to comprehend that others work better than them and therefore deserve to be paid more?

Those people undermine themselves I think when these conversations are had.

 

[quotemokc]

The fact that employers don't want their employees to talk about their wages says it all.

 

[killtaker1993]

I don't give a turkey what my co-workers make, if I can't spend their money I ain't counting it

 

[banner31]

I've personally never been in a job where one person, man, woman or beast doing the same job earns more or less than somebody else.

You’ll find no actual data exists!
Just very selective vicid claims of comparison of two different industries

 

[Messenger]

yes you should know what others are paid. Workers needs to speak out about their wages. Its the only way we end up with equal pay rates for equal work.

companies dont want you to speak out as they know they will be able to dud some people with low pay if they keep wages a secret.

You shouldn’t know, but not because some people are being dudded but because the argument will be framed as “they shouldn’t get more than me” rather than “I deserve more”.

It brings every petty animus to the forefront, regardless of how the pay scheme makes sense overall.

 

[Seeds]

You shouldn’t know, but not because some people are being dudded but because the argument will be framed as “they shouldn’t get more than me” rather than “I deserve more”.

It brings every petty animus to the forefront, regardless of how the pay scheme makes sense overall.

That's the argument companies use to dud people pay.

It's infantilsiing workers to claim they are too immature to cope with knowing what others earn.

 

[Messenger]

That's the argument companies use to dud people pay.

It's infantilsiing workers to claim they are too immature to cope with knowing what others earn.

If you get transparency beyond an enterprise agreement you’ll find the infants pretty quick.

Wage structures among a group of staff need to eliminate anomalies as often as possible and have clarity and objective criteria for gradings/classifications.

 

[Ben The Donkey]

That's the argument companies use to dud people pay.

It's infantilsiing workers to claim they are too immature to cope with knowing what others earn.

Emotive term, but if most of them are too "immature" to cope with their own lack of quality, then perhaps infantilising them has merit?

 

[Scotland]

Yeah I get that argument, I don’t know, I feel awkward knowing what everyone else is paid.

I work in sales anyway, I don’t reckon anyone in my sort of role gets the exact same. Your value is skewed by if you have a degree, how much experience, technical background etc etc

It's an odd one.

If you 'need' to know how much everyone is paid then go and ask them. If you feel awkward doing that then maybe you don't 'need' to know as badly as you thought.

I look at it like trade week in footy. If I get $x and am offered $y to leave, can I use that to get $y to stay? Maybe. If someone roughly comparable to me comes in and gets $y, does that mean I deserve $y? Etc.

 

[sataris]

yes you should know what others are paid. Workers needs to speak out about their wages. Its the only way we end up with equal pay rates for equal work.

companies dont want you to speak out as they know they will be able to dud some people with low pay if they keep wages a secret.

There's no such thing as 'equal work', unless you work on a manufacturing line and you can directly count how many purple widgets you've made today.

I understand it's a simple, easy to remember slogan, but it fails the momeny you move into something service based.

Imagine going to a performance review and hearing "I would love to pay you more for the excellent work you did on project X, but I can't pay you more than Y"

PS: This actually happened to me.