You wanna know what pisses me off?Follow

Never claimed I did. Just ******* about the extra work put on me and the other people I work with when their parents call in sick to take care of them. And that is was socially acceptable to do this at the company I work for. But for people who are married and do not have kids, its frowned upon. That's all really.

True! It would at least allow me more time off from work!

I have a staff of 22. Out of these, about ten have kids and they call in LESS than the ones without, because they depend on those paychecks to feed them and aren't calling in b/c Macy's has a sale or they're hung over. That said, one has a bad divorce situation so she is frequently out in court and with her children's illnesses. I monitor her unexcused absences, and should I need to, I'll discipline her for them. If she wats to be exempt from discipline but hold on to her job, then she has the option of taking leave and using her vacation to pay for it. From an employer standpoint, you are treated no different, and the impact on my staff is the same no matter who is absent, because it sucks to be understaffed no matter what. Now the fact that some of them might be upset as to WHY someone called out just tells me they are whiny cnuts, and I keep it in mind when it's time to evaluate their overall attitude at their yearly review.

Edited, Dec 21st 2006 2:06pm by Atomicflea

I agree with Yoda's assessment of the situation. Social skills are often less valuable in work enviornments that do not include customer interaction. I also agree that time spent off work caring for newborns is time you are not making acheivements for your company. I would also agree that having lots of call-ins (reguardless of the reason) will reflect negatively on reviews. I think we all agree that those things combined overall makes any person appear to be less valuable to a company than someone who was there everyday and got the job done as quickly as possible without spending time to talk to other employees. That alone would account for a lot of pay variances between men and women.

The social personality brings more hurdles for women to deal with. Women(in general) are less likely to brag about their acheivements to their boss(which keeps those acheivements fresh in their mind) than men are(as men are more competitive in general). Women are also less likely to fight for more money at review time than men are (largely due to wanting to be everyone's friend, or avoiding perceived conflict).

Of course there are many women who do not fit the general model. I'm willing to bet that those women have comparable if not better pay than the men they work with. It's always been performance that dictates pay. If you feel that you aren't getting the pay you deserve then you're probably exhibiting multiple traits that put you at a disadvantage whether you are male or female. The only thing you can do is change your priorities and your competitiveness and your company will value you more(Value dictates pay). It's not like men magically make more money, they just generally have more valuable personality traits.

Edit: fixed broken quote

Edited, Dec 21st 2006 2:26pm by Ranzera

1) learn to quote properly

2) way to ignore a point, or is the very basic logic at work here just too complex for you?

3) this has nothing to do with a person's individual reasons for having kids (and the presumption that you know mine is absolutely asinine and just goes to show just how weak your position is.) It has to do with the benefits society derives from contributing to the well-being of children, mainly by supporting parents in their attempts to provide for that well-being, which when you think about it, is not a lot to ask.

A child who is not properly reared is astronomically more likely to cost society more in terms of healthcare, welfare, and burden on the criminal justice system, while providing little to no benefit from that investment.

A child who is properly reared is astronomically more likely to become a productive, contributing citizen who will benefit society tenfold the initial investment of time, energy and cost for that child's upbringing. They will shoulder the burden of the previous generation's retirement, and the next generations education. Therefore it is in all our best interests to see that they receive the advantage of a good upbringing, primarily by supporting their parents in their endeavors to provide them with that upbringing.

We NEED the next generation in order to survive as a society, and yet as a nation we do everything in our power to make providing for that next generation difficult to impossible, and we begrudge the people who DO make that investment in the future and who compell us to do likewise.

Let's hearken back for a moment to the Great Breastfeeding Debate of a few weeks ago.

Now, no one can deny the health benefits of breastfeeding for a child--foremost of which is a healthier child who doesn't get ill as often or for as long due to his strengthened immune system. And yet, many mothers are compelled to stop providing breastmilk for their children far earlier than the WHO, American Academy of Pediatritians, or American Assn. of Family Physicians recommends, because they do not have a space and/or time in their workplace to express (pump) breastmilk.

Those same mothers for whom we cannot be bothered to take the time, money, and inconvenience to provide a reasonably comfortable pumping space and time to pump are more likely, over the course of the next dozen or so years, to end up taking time off their jobs to care for ill children.

So--you can sack up and pitch in to give a mother 20 minutes pumping time a few times a day this year by helping shoulder the workload, or you can shoulder a day or even a week worth of her workload next year when she's compelled to take time off to care for a child through an illness he most likely would never have gotten if he'd had the benefits of prolonged breastfeeding.

So, you be the judge--bear a little inconvenience now, or a lot of inconvenience later. Either way, quit your damn whining.



Edited, Dec 21st 2006 3:42pm by Ambrya

He was talking about typical behavior. Behavior, job performance, and seniority should be the only factors considered in a person's salary. Yoda's theory (and I'm not saying it's valid) is that behavior likely to garner a lower salary is more prevalent among women.

Basing salary off some kind of gender test would be ridiculous. Basing salary off the actual performance of each individual worker is completely fair. [/quote]

This is exactly where I was going, and it is just a theory. It certainly won't fit every situation but we're talking about general numbers here, not specific instances.

If in the future women's behavior becomes more task oriented and men's behavior becomes more socially oriented I imagine pay scales will start to balance out or even reverse.

This of course isn't likely as apparently female brains have a higher portion devoted to communication (hence social orientation) than male brains, and male brains have a higher portion devoted to sex (which makes us more impulsive).

Although there are societal pressures that shape behavior as well, so there could be some movement towards fewer differences between men and women, but we'll certainly never be exactly the same.

Now I'm just rambling :)

Yes, let's hearken back shall we. Wasn't that the other thread where you demanded that all non-breeders bow down to your snot-nosed offspring because it takes a goddamned village and everyone should be responsible for your child?

You're sort of a one hit wonder with that aren't you? You're coming off just as selfishly entitled as your "opponent". The only difference, and one that means much more to you than most, is that you have a parasite in your belly that you're going to expect to share the burden of with everyone when it squirts loose. The lack of that is what he feels strengthens his position.

You two should get married and have kids...

Just to add to my point. (not trying to pick on you)

From an employers point of view this just dropped your value. In the case you are describing a man will put in an 8hr day, a woman now puts in an 8hr day but is only actually working for 7 of them (20 mins 3 times a day = 1hr of breast pumping). They now have to pay another person for an hour because you are a woman that is breastfeeding. It makes you higher maintenance. Your employer doesn't care about your breast feeding, they care about how much you're doing for them and what your value/dollar is.

Can you help it? No, you have to feed your baby.

Is it going to lower your employment value compared to a man that doesn't have to do this? Absolutely. In this particular case a man with similar skills would be doing more work than you are, and therefore be worth more to the company.

This post illustrates my point. As a woman you're arguing the social aspect (caring for your child). Your immediate priority is with your family not your job, while you're at work. Noone is going to blame you for it, you're right to think that way given the situation, but John Doe next to you is going to get a bigger raise next year because he's putting in more actual work hours than you are.

Yes, they could quite easily do the same thing to a single male father (I know it's a stretch). I see your point though, but I'm not convinced that it is the norm. You are quoting specially selected articles from an women's rights website, not exactly unbiased.

I'm not saying it doesn't happen, I'm saying it doesn't happen enough to explain the gap in payscales. My theory explains the reason for the gap at a large scale. If you look at an entire country's gross income and compare Male to Female my theory applies.

I'm Canadian, maybe there's just more descrimination in the US.

My logic isn't flawed, you didn't mention anything about doing this on your break. You mentioned other people shouldering the load while you did it. Which would mean you're doing it on company time, otherwise noone would be shouldering the load, you would be on a scheduled break. If you are only doing this on your break my post doesn't apply.

I didn't include the mention of breaks in my response to bub because it was irrelevent to my point, which was the cost-benefit analysis of giving a little bit of assistance now versus a lot of assistance later.

In my post to you, I said "most" pumping time happens on breaks.

Let's say the average pumping session is 20-30 minutes. The average employee gets a 15 minute break in the morning, an 30-60 minute lunch, and a 15 minute break in the afternoon over the course of the usual 8-5 workday. This means that the time a woman spends away from her desk (if she pumsp three times a day) during actual non-break time is somewhere between 10 to 30 minutes.

And you still didn't address the idea of actual productivity, which was the entire point.

Again, I understand your theory, but it's based on a false premise: that businesses overvalue what are considered traditionally 'male' traits and undervalue 'female' ones. Almost any recruiter will tell you they want a candidate who is adaptable to change, a quick learner, creative and a team player: all 'female' traits. To say that men are the only ones equipped with the tools to be successful in business is just plain inacurrate.

LMAO good point