Gender Discrimination in the Workplace

Gender Discrimination still continues unabated even after so much awareness is generated and legislations enforced to that effect. It is the responsibility of the human resource managers to oversee the company's policies and to ensure that fair treatment is meted out to women in the organization.

Gender discrimination still continues to be a universal problem and even in the United States, the nation known for its freedom and equal rights women haven't faired any better. Discrimination is most obvious in the workplace where women continue to be viewed inferior. Right from hiring workers, to position and pay details, there is a marked discrimination at every point. Instances of sexual harassment have not ceased and there is without any doubt a male hegemony in the corporate sector. Even in multinational companies, which have a human resource management department, to address the concerns of the workers, discrimination continues unabated. Let us discuss the topic in a little detail so that we would get a better perspective of the problem.

Hiring workers

There is clear evidence that in general men are the preferred candidates for any position (other than those excusive for women) in the job market. Even when candidates form both the sexes possess similar qualification employers show a distinct bias in favor of men. An audit study conducted on restaurant recruitment pattern in Philadelphia attested to the existence of discrimination. In the above study mock resumes were used to find out the hiring pattern of restaurants throughout the state. The results revealed that women in general received offers from poor paying restaurants while the bigger well paying restaurants preferred men. [Neumark]

When it comes to promotions there is an even more blatant discrimination against women. Men occupy most of the high-ranking positions within a corporate structure even when women with similar qualifications and experience are available. A study conducted by the U.S. General accounting Office pertaining to the performance of women in the managerial cadre clearly indicated that "an invisible- but impenetrable- barrier between women and the executive suite, preventing them from reaching the highest levels of the business world regardless of their accomplishments and merits." [John D. Dingell]. This makes clear the existence of discrimination and the reason why women tend to be relegated to lesser roles within the office. The research also shows that "While women make up 46.5% of the workforce, they represent only 12% of all corporate officers" [John D. Dingell]

Even in the scientific circle women are seen in the lesser light. The outcome of a study conducted by Nancy Hopkins (senior biologist), on the working conditions of women in the MIT, was a startling revelation. The study highlighted the glaring discrepancy in the recruitment pattern and the discrimination meted out to women scientists. The shocking observation was that for a period of 10 years from 1985 to 1994, the number of women researchers and teachers working in the MIT's were less than 1/10th of the men. Helen Davies, a senior microbiologist of the University of Pennsylvania says, "It rates as one of the most important reports on academic women in science in the past two decades because it concerns one of the most important research universities and resulted in an admission of discrimination,." [Natasha Loder]

Salary Scale (Differences)

Though virtually every state has enforced fair wage acts there is still a lot of difference in wages earned between the two sexes. Over the last 20 years or so the wage statistics indicate that women earn only around 75% of what men earn. This disproportionate payment is often dismissed under the grounds of the long leave of absence due to pregnancy and other domestic problems that women have to attend to. According to the 1999 statistics released by 'American federation of labor unions' there still exist a huge difference between the wages of men and women. "Equal pay has been the law since 1963. But today, 38 years later, women are still paid less than men -- even when we have similar education, skills and experience," [Rasheeda Bhagat]

In a study conducted on a sample of 807 institutions within the country having 40,878 administrative staff, it was found that women held 43% of the jobs. But the glaring fact is that, most of these women were employed by institutions that were of lower caliber. Because of the inverse relationship between women and the nature of the institutions that employ them women tend to get paid much less. Qualification, experience and other factors being equal, women only managed to earn $40,000 per annum while men with similar position earned $53,600. So we see that women are economically affected because of the discrimination in employing them (by higher institutions). There is also a clear case of occupational discrimination in that women seldom work in the same position as men do. [University of Albany]. Even if the work they do is similar to men organizations give women different titles and consequently lower pays. Studies have also discounted the possibility of explaining the pay disparity as a measure of the difference in skills. A research found that "if women were men with the same credentials, they would earn about 18% more" [Ellen Isaacs]

Sexual Harassment

Sexual harassment is another major problem that women workers have to put up with in a corporate environment. Sexual harassment seems to be an inherent malice even in huge corporations that boast of equal treatment in all aspects. We are hearing more and more cases of sexual harassment in reputed organizations. The enormity of this problem at the workplace is obvious when we study the case of one of the famous automobile giants, Mitsubishi Motors based in Illinois. The shocking reality was that in almost all the departments of the company sexual harassment was common. Investigations that were ordered into the allegations confirmed that more than 350 female workers in different departments were harassed. In admission of this malady the company management finally agreed to pay a total compensation of $34 million. [EEOC]