Gender Inequality Across All Professions - 1799 Words

In the past half century, America has seen a historic decline in gender inequality across many realms of society. Women have reached levels of success that they never have before, finding equality in education, employment and political representation. Yet despite these gains, inequality remains a persistent issue. It is particularly prominent in the workplace, where women face the glass ceiling effect and a significant gender wage gap across all professions. A closer look at the competing explanations – broadly defined as meritocratic versus structural – shows that although the first may play a role in unequal pay, the second, which encompasses systemic problems of discrimination and gender â€Å"pay penalties,† contribute quite significantly†¦show more content†¦So why does a country that values economic growth and gender equality have such a persistent wage gap? Two basic concepts exist for explaining this inequality. The primary one is the â€Å"widely shared and deeply institutionalized belief in meritocracy† (Cech, 2010, p. 371). This belief infers that individuals will gain advantages in a society through their work and their will power, and that those who don’t manage to get ahead are responsible for their own shortcomings and losses. The second explanation uses systemic or structural factors in society that work against individuals to explain inequality. Examples of this include a person’s race, their pre-existing economic status, or disabilities they suffer, all of which could subject the individuals possessing them to social discrimination and thus provide a barrier to advancement or economic gain. Cech (2010) argues that these perceptions are significant in that they inform the specific decisions that people make in movements toward equality. While most Americans believe in the meritocratic explanation for inequality, Cech (2010) argues that different work and social situations will influence what people believe about gender inequality, whether it be meritocratic or structural. For example, lower-class workers tend to hold more structural beliefs, as do primary breadwinners/single mothers. Married women and those with higher-level jobs in their field have a greater tendency