OK, first things first. My two posts in this thread where directed at the tone of several post made, not the OP.
I'm not naming names, but yes, they were some sexist posts. Generalizing all woman based on your rather limited experances is sexist, and implying that woman cannot think in a rational manner is sexist.
Don't expect me to pull my punches with you guys, just because I'm willing to throw punches at sexism rampant amoung the females in this country.
As too the OP. I've been skeptical of the whole pay gap theroy for a long while. Not because it doesn't happen or never happened, but because it fails to take into account a lot of factors that are biological, as well as just plain old commen sense.
First off, woman have babies. Someone has too procreate the earth, and since I don't see you guys stepping up on that whole thing, we have a division right there.
The process to have a child automatically is going to cut into a womans ability to work and make money. Caregiving duties are going to cut into another chunk of time (and, too be fair, in this modern world, this is also going to cut some hours for fathers as well)
Secondly, I think a lot more woman of my generation may be saying "screw it. I'm not pulling the stupid crap my mother did."
Because, it is insane to think you can have a fast paced, high flying career, be a wife AND actually spend some time with ones spawn.
Some woman can pull it off. They are probably as few and far between as those really great male IT specilists.
I think a lot of the outrage over this perceved pay gap is part of the whole ideal of my mothers generation and subsiquent generations of woman that you can have your cake and eat it too. They refuse to acknowledge that, yes, there are only 24 hours in a day, indeed, pregency is PHYSICALLY a strain and raising a child, holding a job and having a life are all time commitments.
Everyone (male, female, hermaphrodite, EVERYONE) has to make choices about how to spend their time and what things they want and what they have to put aside as an "if only I had the time."
And since a lot of women want kids, a lot of woman are going to end up in less time demanding feilds, making less money and all that jazz. It's not sexism. It's freaking time management. Unfortunatly, some woman (and "elightened modern" men) fail to understand that making babies isn't a highly paid feild of employment (actually, I belive it's working for a loss) and they want to bitch about it.
There really was once a time when woman did make less money for the same exact job as a man. I honestly don't think it happens anymore. That's a battle that's been fought and won. So have a lot of the other examples of sexism in the workforce. Now we have the insistance that womans lib is still this huge issue because someone just doesn't know how to let go, move on and accept that the majority of the battle is won.