Starting Salary Differences Between Women and Men: Organization-Level Findings and an Analysis of Current Policy Options

This study examined the starting salaries paid by over 250 employers to 2,800 university graduates. Of the overall female-male salary difference of $4,396, the majority, or$3,175 (72%), occurred between employers; $1,221 (28$1,221 (28%) of the female-male pay difference. Although adjustment for qualifications such as degree level, grade point average, and college major reduced the pay difference between women and men, our findings indicate that, on average, the same employer pays graduating women 3.5% to 5.8% less than graduating men with similar qualifications

Elimination of gender-related employment disparities through statistical process control

This paper proposes a novel approach that has the potential to hasten the eradication of gender disparities in employment. This approach relies upon the concept of statistical process control (SPC) to more systematically remedy disparate employment outcomes for women. SPC also serves as a new vehicle for conceptualizing the influence of industry on equal employment opportunity (EEO) outcomes. Using data from U.S. Current Population Surveys, we compare industries on EEO performance as assessed by a recently developed Systemic Gender Disparity Scorecard. The theory and practice of SPC suggest that further improvement, and by far the greater opportunity for gender-related EEO progress, necessitates fundamental changes in each industry's practices and norms that serve as barriers to gender parity. We recommend more resources to support collaboration between employers and EEO enforcement agencies.Women - Employment

New Directions in Compensation Research: Synergies, Risk, and Survival

We describe and use two theoretical frameworks, the resource-based view of the firm and institutional theory, as lenses for examining three promising areas of compensation research. First, we examine the nature of the relationship between pay and effectiveness. Does pay typically have a main effect or, instead, does the relationship depend on other human resource activities and organization characteristics? If the latter is true, then there are synergies between pay and these other factors and thus, conclusions drawn from main effects models may be misleading. Second, we discuss a relatively neglected issue in pay research, the concept of risk as it applies to investments in pay programs. Although firms and researchers tend to focus on expected returns from compensation interventions, analysis of the risk, or variability, associated with these returns may be essential for effective decision-making. Finally ,pay program survival, which has been virtually ignored in systematic pay research, is investigated. Survival appears to have important consequences for estimating pay plan risk and returns, and is also integral to the discussion of pay synergies. Based upon our two theoretical frameworks, we suggest specific research directions for pay program synergies, risk, and survival

Which industries are the best employers for women? An application of a new Equal Employment Opportunity Index

This paper introduces and proposes a policy application for a new Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) Index. The index is comprised of multiple measures of employers' human resource management outcomes and is designed to reflect employers' systemic EEO efforts. The index is applied to industry data from the Current Population Survey, and the tenets of Total Quality Management (TQM) theory are used for interpretation of results. It is found that the mining/construction industry provides a relatively inhospitable climate for women in the form, primarily, of a high degree of gender-related occupational segregation. The financial industry demonstrated the overall greatest gains for women during the 1990s. Closer examination of these industries with very good and very poor outcomes highlights the importance of addressing "special causes" of industry performance on the index

Elimination of Gender-Related Employment Disparities through Statistical Process Control

This paper proposes a novel approach that has the potential to hasten the eradication of gender disparities in employment. This approach relies upon the concept of statistical process control (SPC) to more systematically remedy disparate employment outcomes for women. SPC also serves as a new vehicle for conceptualizing the influence of industry on equal employment opportunity (EEO) outcomes. Using data from U.S. Current Population Surveys, we compare industries on EEO performance as assessed by a recently developed Systemic Gender Disparity Scorecard. The theory and practice of SPC suggest that further improvement, and by far the greater opportunity for gender-related EEO progress, necessitates fundamental changes in each industry's practices and norms that serve as barriers to gender parity. We recommend more resources to support collaboration between employers and EEO enforcement agencies

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal, v. 4, 2021 (complete issue)

Table of Contents Being a Feminist Community During a Pandemic: Our Editors’ Welcome by Jill Swiencicki, Lisa Cunningham, & Mary E. Graham Creating Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal by Deborah Uman & Barbara LeSavoy Disrupters: Three Women of Color Tell Their Stories by Dulce María Gray, Denise A. Harrison, & Yuko Kurahashi Contemporary Black Women’s Voting Rights Activism: Some Historical Perspective by Alison Parker, Valeria Sinclair-Chapman, & Naomi R. Williams Shapeshifting Power: Indigenous Teachings of Trickster Consciousness and Relational Accountability for Building Communities of Care by Ionah M. Elaine Scully Influencing Public Opinion: Public Relations and the Arrest of Susan B. Anthony by Arien Rozelle #THEMTOO: Two NFL Team Options for Not Exploiting Women Cheerleaders by Melanie Kelly, Colby A. Murphy, & Mary E. Graham Feminist Attitudes, Behaviors, and Culture Shaping Women’s Center Practice by Angela Clark-Taylor, Emily Creamer, Barbara LeSavoy, & Catherine Cerull

#THEMTOO: Two NFL Team Options for Not Exploiting Women Cheerleaders

This paper presents the results of an exploratory study of why and how professional football teams in the National Football League (NFL) use cheerleaders, the vast majority of whom are women. From archival press reports, media guides, and team website content, we examine why some teams choose not to use cheerleaders; and among the majority of teams that do use cheerleaders, the purposes for which they employ them. Based upon the findings, we categorize teams into two groups: (a) NFL teams that do not use cheerleaders but that also fail to capitalize on this potential competitive advantage; and (b) NFL teams that present sexually exploited cheer squads but that complicate public perceptions by emphasizing cheerleaders’ more legitimate roles (e.g., philanthropy). We conclude with two options for NFL teams seeking to avoid the sexual exploitation of women cheerleaders. We also urge cheerleaders to consider unionization

Being a Feminist Community During a Pandemic: Our Editors’ Welcome

Volume 4, the pandemic issue of The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal, features a selection of participants from our 2020 gathering who have transformed their conference offerings into articles for posterity, ones that aim to keep the dialogue going and widen the sphere of feminist inquiry

Group Gender Composition and Work Group Relations: Theories, Evidence, and Issues

[Excerpt] Prior to the publication of Kanter\u27s seminal Men and Women of the Corporation in 1977, the field of organizational studies exhibited a striking degree of oblivion to the effect of gender relations on work group dynamics. This neglect may have been due, in part, to the relatively small proportion of women in the labor force in the first half of the 20th century, as well as to high levels of occupational and job segregation, which helped conceal the influence of group gender composition on individual and group behavior. In the postwar years, however, women\u27s rate of entry into the labor force nearly doubled that of the preceding three decades, and women began to occupy many jobs and occupations that had been the near-exclusive province of men. In this context, Kanter\u27s provocative analysis of the impact of work group gender composition on group relations served as the impetus for an outpouring of both theoretical and empirical work. Studies following Kanter\u27s have explored the effects of gender composition on a wide range of outcomes, based on a variety of theoretical perspectives. In this chapter, we review five major theoretical paradigms that, singly or in combination, have provided the underpinning for most empirical studies, then review the findings from empirical work, focusing on the degree to which they provide support for each perspective. In concluding, we identify several avenues that merit greater attention in future research and theorizing