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Wage Inequities based on Race and Gender - Coggle Diagram

- - - - People unable to participate in economy + contribute to trade
        
        Check out Pew Research Analysis on household wealth and the economy: Trends in income and wealth inequality
        
        When people don't have equivalent or high enough wages, they don't participate as much in the economy. This has a drastic effect on small and local businesses and can cause economic decline. In the Economic Policy Institute's writings on raising the minimum wage during 2012, they found, “Across the phase-in period of the minimum-wage increase, GDP would increase by roughly $25 billion, resulting in the creation of approximately 100,000 net new jobs over that period," (Cooper 2012). Although this was regarding a few years ago, the impacts are the same. The data displays the possible benefits of raising the wage, however, we can see the status-quo is the opposite, with less participation in the economy and more un-employement. With low wages, people don't participate in the economy, as they can not afford it. And we can see this happening today, as prices continue to rise, the wages are not matching this leading to less economic activity.
    - - We are all familiar with the word, 'labor strike'. Throughout history people have held walk-outs, strikes and boycotts of businesses that mistreat their employees. Making this a prevalent effect of wage inequality. Recently, there has been a movement called the 'Great Resignation' in which employees are protesting the system they work in. This blogger covers the concept, "Workers are protesting a system that only serves a tiny class of the highly privileged and wealthy powerful elite and their corporations at the expense of millions of laborers," (Fagan 2021). With people unable to afford basic necessities and working under cruel employers, strikes and boycotts are highly likely to occur and escalate quickly.
        
        I would recommend reading more on what Fagan has to say: Don’t Call It a Labor Strike
    - - Decrease in quality of Life
        
        When people have low wages they are unable to afford basic necessities like housing, food and clothing. This makes the cycle of poverty worsens with low wages, which makes people unable to provide for there family, which can send their children into the vicious cycle as well.
    - - Wage inequities can be directly compared to the impact of a low wage, as is. When people are in a situation of high financial stress, and low income, they are more likely to experience symptoms of depression and serious stress, "In fact, financial stressors like debt, unemployment, low income, and past homelessness, may make someone 20 times more likely to attempt suicide, according to a 2020 study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology." (Crescione 2021). When seeing how low wage can manifest in a mental health crisis, we can understand that an equal division of pay in ANY company is crucial to an employee's health. On another note, people at a disadvantaged wage due to their identity may feel more lasting effects in their self-confidence and perception of importance in society. This is why it is crucial to address the wage gap so we can better support our workers
- - - - Raising the minimum wage can ensure that all employees are accounted for in minimum wage work. As stated in an article on minimum wage and the racial divide, "By design, minimum wages boost the pay of workers who are among the lowest-paid in the U.S. labor market. And Black workers have the highest share of those who are paid the minimum wage among all major racial and ethnic groups in the United States." (Derenoncourt 2020). Meaning that employers can't pick and choose who gets a livable wage, rather it would be mandated by the government. The impact of this could greatly minimize the racial wage gap. As the artcile also notes, "Increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour, for example, would increase the earnings of 38.1 percent of Black workers, compared to 23.2 percent of White workers."(Derenoncourt 2020). Displaying that raising the minimum wage can combat this wage disparity and bring many people out of the poverty line.
        
        This can all be advocated for by calling local officials in your area! This is a great way to display the Catholic Social teaching of Solidarity, as you may not be affected by wage inequality, but you are still showing support.
      - To check out how politicians are working on this read: Increasing the Minimum Wage
    - - Labor unions are the voice between the employer and the employees. It can help the employees to recieve the compensation they deserve and creates space to tackle topics like discrimination within the workplace. As noted in a Forbes article, "Lower wages are a reflection of growing powerlessness, the result of four intersecting trends. First, unions have become almost mythical creatures, unicorns of the labor market. Just one in 20 workers in the US private sector are members of a trade union, down from more than one in four in the 1950s." (Reeves 2019). The only way to combat the ongoing powerlessness of workers, and reccurent racsim and sexism of their bosses is through the rebuilding of worker's unions. Throughout history they have helped to advocate for worker compensation, and can be rebuilt to speak on the topic of racism in the workplace.
        
        "Union members earn better wages and benefits than workers who aren’t union members. On average, union workers’ wages are 11.2% higher than their nonunion counterparts."(The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organization). This goes to show how well worker's unions really work and the need to rebuild them stronger than ever!
- - - - Check out how research found this to be true: Research: Customers Will Reward Companies for Smaller Gender Pay Gaps
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        Due to generational financial problems, many people are unable to afford higher education. On top of this, students may have to drop out of high school to support their families through minimum wage work. Regardless, it is clear that this is a continuous cycle, lack of income leads to inaccessibility to education, which in our system means your wage is lower. As noted by Vilorio, "For example, workers with a professional degree had the highest median weekly earnings ($1,730) and lowest unemployment rate (1.5 percent) in 2015 of all groups shown. That’s more than triple the earnings ($493) and less than one-fifth the unemployment rate (8.0 percent) of workers with less than a high school diploma."(Vilorio 2016).
        This ties back to wage inequality based on race, when we look at the way people of color are at a disadvantage for accumulating wealth. An example of this is redlining, which made it impossible for people of color to buy and sit on property. Without this, they didn't earn overtime or gain the same wealth as many white families did. Today, this presents in students of color having to drop out to support their families, because the system itself put them and their families at an economic disadvantage.(Perry 2019).
  - - - As Kayla Patrick notes, in her blog on the wage gap, "Later, in 1967 just three years after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited race discrimination in employment, Black women typically made 43 cents for every dollar paid to white men. In 2015, nearly 50 years later, this wage gap remained enormous. Black women who worked full-time, year round were typically paid only 63 cents for every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men," (Patrick 2017). As illustrated in this blog excerpt, people of color, specifically Black people, have been declining equal wages for decades. This is still affecting the present, showing that a root cause of the wage gap, is the long history of racism in the United States. A sentiment that is still held by many employers who don't work on their implicit and explicit bias.
  - - - Noted by Forbes, Karl Marx viewed capitalism as an ongoing threat to the wellbeing of the worker, "For Karl Marx, the whole capitalist system was ineluctably rigged against workers. Whatever the short-run victories of the trade unions, the capitalist retained the power; the ultimate control, over workers’ time. And the worker would remain forever alienated from their work," (Reeves 2019). Karl Marx makes a good assessment on the power and greed capitalism can brew within executives at companies. When capitalism encourages the accumulation of personal assets rather than communal assets, employers are less likely to share their business's earnings with their employees, making the wage pool decrease.
        The article proceeds to state," It is the market power of one firm versus another that determines wages, rather than the power of a particular employer versus its workers. Even if workers can get organized, they cannot force a completely different employer to share more of their surplus with them. (Now that would be socialism.)"(Reeves 2019). Displaying how complicated it is to get the business owners to pay their employees fair wages, and to moderate a fair wage across the board. Now, tying back to the previously mentioned root causes, racism and the patriarchy, we can see how employers will be more likely to discriminate while writing paychecks. With literally 10 women and 1 black person on the list of Forbes 100 billionaires (Locker 2018) there is no shock that the majority of white men who run businesses will allow their bias to further the previously stated root causes of the wage gap.
        
        To check out an example of this, just look at Jeff Bezos: Amazon warehouse workers on Staten Island to file for union election
  - - - In western culture, there has been a sentiment implemented that women stay at home, while men go out to provide. This is abundantly clear, when assessing how little girls are influenced by their parents to be interested in more 'girly' jobs, "A 2005 study found third-grade girls rated their math competency scores much lower than boys’, even when these girls’ performance did not lag behind that of their male counterparts," (Schieder 2016). This article displays the way girls are often put down for liking math or science, as it is a male dominated field. This report goes on to explain that many women skip over these male dominated fields, for female dominated ones, that inherently pay less.(Schieder 2016). This phenomenon directly replicates that of the once widely followed gender norms. As parents influence their female children to pursue careers that will still allow them time for motherhood and home duties, they are inadvertently agreeing to a low wage.
        However, less into the deeper root, we have a glaring example. As the report on women's work finds, "But even when men and women work in the same occupation—whether as hairdressers, cosmetologists, nurses, teachers, computer engineers, mechanical engineers, or construction workers—men make more, on average, than women (CPS microdata 2011–2015)."(Schieder 2016). Displaying that if one, wants to argue over women choosing to be in lower paying fields, one can still see that men in those field earn more. Showing how society as a whole values male labor more than female labor.