Equal pay has been a hot button issue in recent years. While many support equal pay legislation comedian Bill Burr has stirred up controversy with his stance that the gender pay gap is exaggerated. In this article we’ll analyze Burr’s arguments and discuss why his perspective falls short.
Burr argues that the 77 cents on the dollar statistic is misleading. He claims women choose lower-paying jobs like social work and teaching while dangerous jobs dominated by men pay more due to hazard pay. But his logic ignores key facts.
Breaking Down The Gender Pay Gap
The reality is that the gender pay gap persists in nearly all occupations. When controlling for job type, experience, education and other compensable factors, women still earn less than men:
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Female financial specialists make just 66% as much as males.
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Female truck drivers earn 75% of what men earn.
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Among managers, women make 79 cents for every male dollar.
Occupational differences account for no more than 8% of the gap. The pay discrepancy holds up across industries.
How Discrimination and Bias Drive Earnings Down
Burr conveniently overlooks the impact of bias and discrimination on women’s pay. Decades of research reveals some sobering facts:
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Identical resumes with male names yields more callbacks and higher salary offers versus the same resumes with female names.
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Performance evaluations for women are more negative compared to men’s, despite identical work product.
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Women must have higher GPAs to be hired out of college compared to male peers.
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Women often lack access to high-paying jobs due to harassment and biased recruitment and hiring practices.
Discrimination knocks women out of competition for higher salaries from day one. Burr ignores this reality.
Motherhood Introduces Yet Another Pay Gap
Once women have children, the pay gap widens further. One study found fathers earned more, while mothers earned less after parenthood. Why?
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Mothers often lose promotional opportunities due to stereotypes that they’re less devoted to work.
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Mothers can be “mommy tracked” into reduced hour or flexible jobs that pay less.
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Fathers face no loss of pay – and may even benefit from a “fatherhood bonus”.
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Childcare and domestic duties fall more heavily on women.
Blaming women’s choices ignores constraints and barriers mothers face in balancing careers and families. There are no easy fixes like telling women to move into higher paying fields.
What Accounts For Bill Burr’s Perspective?
As a successful male comedian, Burr derives significant privilege from the status quo. It’s unsurprising he resists facts that implicate biases favoring his group. Psychologists note people are motivated to see their success as based on merit rather than unearned advantage.
Burr also likely underestimates male advantages. Those who receive benefits from systems of privilege are often oblivious and attribute success solely to hard work. Denial of discrimination preserves self-esteem.
Men in traditionally male roles may have limited exposure to female experiences of bias, harassment, and unfair pay. Some men react defensively to women’s grievances, dismissed as “complaining” rather than valid injustices needing remedy.
The Bottom Line
Burr gets a few things right. Not all of the pay gap results directly from wage discrimination. Structural barriers, unconscious biases, gender norms, and discrimination accumulate disadvantages for women over a lifetime. But multiple careful studies calculate these factors still leave 38% of the gap unexplained except by discrimination.
Burr minimizes the realities women face in fighting for fair and equal pay. But quips aren’t a cogent rebuttal of exhaustive, rigorous research documenting the gender pay gap. His arguments may appeal to those resistant to believing sexism still impacts women’s earnings in 2022. But an objective look at the facts makes clear women haven’t achieved equal pay. Dismissing the pay gap harms efforts to rectify pay discrimination against women.
Bill Burr – why men are paid more than women
FAQ
Who fought for equal pay rights?
“Lilly Ledbetter never set out to be a trailblazer or a household name. She just wanted to be paid the same as a man for her hard work,” Obama said. “But this grandmother from Alabama didn’t give up until I signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act into law, which was my first act as president.”
What role did Bill Burr have in Breaking Bad?
That same year Burr appeared in the comedy film Date Night as Detective Walsh. On April 18, 2011, he guest hosted the Hollywood Babble-On podcast alongside Ralph Garman. From 2011 to 2013, he played Patrick Kuby on AMC’s Breaking Bad in the fourth and fifth seasons.
What is the main point of the equal pay bill?
Equal Pay Act says that men and women who work in the same place must be paid the same for the same work. The jobs need not be identical, but they must be substantially equal. Job content (not job titles) determines whether jobs are substantially equal.
Which president signed the equal pay law?
