How to Prevent Discrimination against Women
Surprisingly so to some people, females have made some really amazing strides in the last few decades when it comes to things like equality in jobs, especially jobs that were formerly only migrated to men i.e.; Chef's, Electricians, Construction Workers, even Carpenters. But, not surprisingly, there are still companies, businesses and other places of work where lawsuits are still happening and women are still fighting for equality. According to a recent report from the Economic Advisors from The White House Council, women, not men, make up for half the workforce and yet, they make the least amount of money. Hm. Food for thought. Not only do women make up a larger amount of the workforce, but they are unfortunately respected less, paid less, "heard" less and treated differently. You would think in this day and age this wouldn't be the issue at hand, especially considering how many laws there are against these things, and yet it still happens every single day. If you want to try and prevent women from being yet another statistic or you simply don’t want this type of behavior going on in your business, read below for some tips brought to you by a top employment Law Attorney about women in the workplace. You will also find some solid static is with quoted information from sites like Wiki, http://www.equalrights.org/, http://nawbo.org/, and more.
The Boys Club You may or may not have heard of this term before. Essentially it’s a group or activity such as the Board of Directors that is all male. If you are one of the higher ups and your board of directors is like this, you might want to consider adding a few women to the mix. Not only is this a way to show that you are not discriminatory, but it sends a powerful message to everyone else in the business that you provide an equal and accepting place of business.
Illegal Interview Questions Just like with hiring on older folks, illegal and discriminatory questions should not be asked. You as an employer need to recognize if any of your HR people or managers are doing this when hiring and interviewing people. Managers that hire people shouldn't ask any questions, really, about personal lives such as about their kids, family type, family life, etc. The questions should only be related to the job in question; experience, skills, etc. Gender Gaps and Salary If you think gender gaps and salary don’t exist, consider some of these stats found on a few different websites: African-American women earn 64 cents to every dollar earned by white men and Hispanic women just 52 cents per dollar. Whether it’s attitudes about race or gender that are at play, it’s clear that something needs to be done to level the playing field. Women earned less than men in 99% of all occupations. In virtually every field that women choose to enter, they can expect to earn less over their lifetime than their male counterparts. This means that over 47 years of full-time work, this gap amounts to an estimated loss in wages for women of $700,000 for high school graduates, $1.2 million for college grads, and $2 million for professional school grads–a staggering amount. Women account for 46% of the labor force, but 59% of workers making less than $8 an hour. What does it mean? It means that many women are taking on jobs that pay well under a living wage. With nearly 16% of U.S. households having women who are divorced, widowed or never married as the sole providers, this leaves many women at a distinct disadvantage and struggling to make ends meet as they dominate jobs in lowpaying fields. Women make only 77.5 cents for every dollar that men earn. This figure comes from data on the 2003 census. Despite this gap, many economists feel that the gap between pay for men and women is due to different personal choices men and women make about personal fulfillment, child rearing and hours at work. Whichever you choose to believe, the reality is that the gap is slowly but surely closing as women become increasingly educated and dual income families become the norm, but this isn’t much consolation to those who feel discriminated against today.
As you can see by these figures, salaries and male versus female positions do exist, even in 2015. If you want a great way to kill gender based neutralities, make sure that people (not men or women, but people) are promoted, given salaries, or paid via their work experience, how well they are doing with your company, skills and attributes they have that will help your company, etc. Don't just give men an automatic pass because they are men or vice versa for that matter. Any good employment Law Attorney will tell you that both men and women get discriminated against, however, its women who feel the brunt of it.