As Women Take Over a Male-Dominated Field, the Pay Drops

[ArmorPierce]

To me, this could actually point to a different, but still real, issue. As more women enter a field, there are more total qualified candidates to take jobs in that field then there were when just men were in it, so the workers in that field becomes less valuable. It seems possible that existing male workers continue to earn their old larger salaries, while new male and female workers earn less.

That is certainly a factor, and should be accounted for. However, the article in the OP also cites the opposite happening when men took over a previously woman-dominated field. As more men became computer programmers, pay increased. In that case, either pay was increasing even though the labor pool was growing, which means that the size of the labor pool is not the sole factor (though other factors may not be related to sexism, like if increase in demand outstripped the increase in labor), or female programmers were leaving the field in such large numbers that the total labor pool was shrinking despite the influx of male programmers, which raises the question of why women would leave the field in such large numbers.

That's actually very simple to provide an answer to, and you pretty much supplied the answer on your own.

For the most part, people's salaries are not just arbitrary numbers. It is determined by supply and demand. Supply for labor and demand for. I am not going to pretend that this is the only factor, because it is not and there certainly is a significant amount of classism, nepotism, racism and sexism out there, no question about it. Ihave experienced my fair share of it.

Now, to answer your question regarding the transformation of the computer programmer career from female dominated to male dominated, we must explore several points.

1. Did labor demand increase? Increase in employer demand would place an upward pressure on wages, in contrast to the downward pressure that a increase in labor supply applies.
2. Did the scope of the job changed? From the description, It appears that a computer programmer back in the day was a menial and relatively low skill job.
3. Did women actually exit the field in such great numbers as you said? Or did the field itself grow?

There you go, explanations to why the salary of a field would change, no sexism needed.

[K. A. Pital]

The fact that there higher levels of representation of women in STEM fields in more repressive and sexist cultures (India, China) subjects the argument to suspect that lower level of representation in the United States is due to sexism.

Or it can demonstrate that sexism is not a monolithic barrier to entry and there are different types of sexism and elitism. There's casual sexism, there's family sexism and there's workplace sexism. It could be that undeveloped societies have more of the former, but less of the latter.

The argument is not whether the soviet union had more or less sexism, the United States was far more sexist too, the question at hand is whether increased or decreased representation of women participation in stem fields are signals of sexism... given the fact that very sexist societies have far greater representation, this appears to not be the case.

See above. That is the point.

In the United States, a far less percentage of folks who pursue college majors pursue it in the stem fields compared to China.

But how do you explain the small share then? I mean, yes, fewere people pursue the career, but why aren't the few who do split by gender in a more equitable fashion?

[ArmorPierce]

The fact that there higher levels of representation of women in STEM fields in more repressive and sexist cultures (India, China) subjects the argument to suspect that lower level of representation in the United States is due to sexism.

Or it can demonstrate that sexism is not a monolithic barrier to entry and there are different types of sexism and elitism. There's casual sexism, there's family sexism and there's workplace sexism. It could be that undeveloped societies have more of the former, but less of the latter.

The link that I posted to the World's Economic Forum's numbers regarding pay equity does not support that hypothesis.

United States
Pay equality: 22
Economic Participation and Opportunity: 8
Educational Attainment: 1

China
Pay equality: 69
Economic Participation and Opportunity: 58
Educational Attainment: 85

The argument is not whether the soviet union had more or less sexism, the United States was far more sexist too, the question at hand is whether increased or decreased representation of women participation in stem fields are signals of sexism... given the fact that very sexist societies have far greater representation, this appears to not be the case.

See above. That is the point.

In the United States, a far less percentage of folks who pursue college majors pursue it in the stem fields compared to China.

But how do you explain the small share then? I mean, yes, fewere people pursue the career, but why aren't the few who do split by gender in a more equitable fashion?

[/quote]

Allow me to start be answering your question with a question. Does more Indians and Chinese folks pursuing STEM degrees mean that there is discrimination against white people in the STEM fields? Did you know that Asian Americans earn more degrees overall? Does that mean that white Americans are discriminated against in society?

There are studies that show that women may actually be favored in the hiring process for STEM degrees. Also, young women in their 20s living in urban area actually out-earning men.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/mor ... s-in-stem/
http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240 ... 0770831192

There are multiple factors that can be contributing to the sex wage disparity.

Now what's the cause of the disparity?

Well here is my hypothesis, and it is pure speculation on my part. I think it is ultimately related to increased comfort and independent freedom afforded by being part of a wealthy and individualistic culture and women without power afforded more opportunity to 'settle' compared to a man. Below is a further breakdown of my thoughts:

1. Collectivist culture vs Individualistic culture

Asians cultures are far more collectivist compared to western cultures. As such, they receive far greater help from extended family to raise and rear children. Raising children effectively is a time consuming process that is challenging to balance with a full time career.

2. Increased free choice and opportunity.

Being in an more individualistic culture increases individual freedom to make personal choices. Being part of an established and wealthy class also provides increased opportunity and choices. People simply don't need to think about prioritizing maximizing their wealth. In fact, these people are often in favor of policies to reduce the challenges they face. An example, I often see is these folks being in favor of reducing homework and standardized testing in favor of more bias prone subjective measures of ability. These folks simply do not want be forced to continue competing to maintain their established position in society against the hordes of highly educated and competitive Asians.

3. Other Cultural and biological considerations.

This one might be controversial, but I think that society inherently has a floor for the value of women, but men's worth correlated with the amount of status and power he has. As a result, women are more likely to be comfortable in their social position rather than making a power grab or sacrifice in the present for potential pay-off in the future. Men generally are higher risk takers, perhaps out of necessity, and that can be supported by males engaging in higher-risk activities.

Then there are other biological consideration such as biological clock to consider.

[ArmorPierce]

Oh yes I almost forgot a point that I wanted to discuss.

4. Supposed low social power distance society and low reverence given to academic achievement.

The academic books defines American social power distance as low compared to China and India. Despite this the United states has among the greatest disparities in wealth. Why is this? My hypothesis is that this supposed low power distance is what allows this wealth disparity to perpetuate. It feels like the wealthy class are just like you and me. It makes people think that perhaps we can become wealthy too one day despite that facts show that social mobility has stunted over the decades.

Instead, we have a culture that is anti academic and frames academics as ivory tower folks. In other cultures, there is a certain degree of reverence given to academics that just is not present in America. In America, it appears that reverence is given to the wealthy who act like frat boys, I George Bush and Donald Trump.

This results in less incentive to pursue academically rigorous fields.

[Crown]

I realise that the conversation has moved on since this post, so if you can't be arsed going over it again no worries;

That's an evasion of the question asked. The cheap migrant labour is predominately male, but more to the point Asian-American women are approaching parity with white men (and in some instances out performing them). The simple question is; if a company could at a stroke reduce its overhead by 23% why haven't they? If the argument is that sexism is keeping women out of the workforce, is it true then that sexism is actually a more powerful force than practical capitalism theory?

Yes. Some elements of the old order (including prejudices of any kind) can be preserved for a long time and even exist alongside "modern capitalist relations" where each person regardless of race and gender is a nominally equal "workforce unit". They are being destroyed or let live depending on how useful they are. Totally eradicating sexism would lead to pay equality, thus removing the benefit from female labour on the cheap.

You're using circular logic; the reason for the pay gap must be sexism, therefor if we remove sexism then there would be no pay gap, and you're dodging the pertinent point; Asian-American women (be they of Indian or Chinese extraction) are approaching parity with white men (which by definition means that they are completely out-performing Hispanic and African-American men). So if the pay gap is entirely driven by sexism then how, in the name of Zeus' butthole has the evil white cis patriarchy designed a system where minority women are out performing other males and reaching parity with white males?

Article and picture

Also I'd like some proof about cheap migrant labour being predominantly male.

The more visible migrant labor is male - the agricultural and construction workers. The maids, nannies, and housekeepers are widely dispersed and inside homes where they're hard to see or count.

Actually for some reason I was conflating the conversation with the recent migrant crisis in Europe, happy to drop this line of the conversation.

[Crown]

The fact that there higher levels of representation of women in STEM fields in more repressive and sexist cultures (India, China) subjects the argument to suspect that lower level of representation in the United States is due to sexism.

Or it can demonstrate that sexism is not a monolithic barrier to entry and there are different types of sexism and elitism. There's casual sexism, there's family sexism and there's workplace sexism. It could be that undeveloped societies have more of the former, but less of the latter.

Anecdotal, take with a grain of salt but actually working in STEM and speaking to a girl of Pakistani heritage and two girls of Indian heritage (the Pakistani was back in Australia) and the two Indians are in the UK but born, raised and educated in India when I asked why they picked Engineering there was a common answer; my parents 'forced' me to.

It wasn't said in any tone that indicated something negative (and for the two Indian girls English is their second language) but they were pretty clear that Engineering was seen as a good job 'for a girl' that would allow them to make good money without being physically taxing.

Make of it what you will.

[ArmorPierce]

Ironically, it appears that the most effective approach to increase enrollment in stem is to restrict individual freedom and choice. Otherwise people simply choose the less challenging or more 'interesting' path.