| DonFerrari said: Very good articles... most of times I turn my face on the allegations of gap claims because the method of analysis is very unclear or biased. But other than the monetary question it was very good (and if we consider the necessity of heavier lifters and the lack of supply it would "justify" paying more for them). If I were asked about working in healthcare I would just say I don't like blood, difficulty of the subject wouldn't be a problem, but the dedication to the career is very serious and necessary. On the second problem I particularly never saw a problem in having more women as teacher before high school, but I can see several instances of teachers that favour female students (but most of cases I saw male teacher doing it) and never saw in a way that it harrassed the male students, but I can't say for other places. Anyway for me it is more of a problem on how female teachers are doing it than the lack of male teachers. And the answer for why there is less male teacher before high school is quite clear on the text, besides the paedophilia suspicion the biggest reason is the lesser payment for under high school than on high school and university. And I agree with you, all distortions must be corrected as needed independently of gender, and hopefully based on more concrete and unbiased studies, and the biggest chance of that to happen is using market reality. |
It's a bit iffy justifying paying male nurses more because they are in higher demand. At first it sounds logical, yet then you get situations where physically strong women get paid less than physically weaker men, and you get the same justified complaints when there's preferential treatment to hiring lesser qualified females over more qualified males in the private sector.
I think more balanced gender distribution is very important in education. That's where children learn how the world works by example. Having male role models in education are just as important as the message itself. It's been a long time since I was in school, and from my memory it was pretty balanced, definitely not the glaring 1 to 10 distribution that article exposes.
However in high school the stereotypes were very much enforced. All science teachers were male, all but 1 language teachers were female. Sure, men and women have better tendencies in those areas, but not at those absolutes. Of course it's a struggle to get more girls into science when all exposure to science at school is from men. At least the principle was a women, not all stereotypes.
I don't know how it is today, my kids aren't in high school yet. Their primary school is pretty much all female. And the first thing I heard about volunteering at school is that you have to go through a police check 3 months prior. Understandable maybe, still rubbed me the wrong way.
And yes, the old stereotypes of patriarchy together with lower payment put men out of primary schools. The man must make more money, something that still nags some people today. Market reality can work, yet with the deck stecked against equality from birth a little more is needed.
