Define comparable worth and explain how it differs from the Equal Pay Act of 1963. Also present some of the arguments, discussions, and research related to this issue.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

: When women dominate an occupational field (such as nursing or secretarial work), the rate of pay for jobs in that field tends to be lower than the pay that men receive when they are the dominant incumbents (e.g., in construction or skilled trades). Is the market biased against jobs held mostly by women? Should jobs dominated by women and jobs dominated by men be paid equally if they are of “comparable” worth to an employer? Answering the latter question involves the knotty problem of how to make valid and accurate comparisons of the relative worth of unlike jobs. The key difference between the Equal Pay Act and the comparable worth standard is this: The Equal Pay Act requires equal pay for men and women who do work that is substantially equal. Comparable worth would require equal pay for work of equal value to an employer (e.g., librarian and electrician).
Here is the crux of the issue: Are women underpaid for their work, or do they merely hold those jobs that are worth relatively less? Existing federal laws do not support the comparable-worth standard. However, several states and cities have enacted laws that require a comparable-worth standard for public employees (Newman, Gerhart, & Milkovich, 2017).
The ultimate resolution of the comparable-worth controversy remains to be seen, but there is an inescapable irony to the whole episode: The Equal Pay Act was passed for the express purpose of eliminating gender as a basis for the payment of wages. Comparable worth, by its very nature, requires that some jobs be labeled “male” and others “female.” In so doing, it makes gender the fundamental consideration in the payment of wages.
Is it possible that the goals of comparable worth can be accomplished through normal labor-market processes? Court decisions to date imply that pay differentials between dissimilar jobs will not be prohibited if the differences can be shown to be based on the content of the work, the value of that work to organizational objectives, and the employer’s ability to attract and retain employees in competitive external labor markets (Newman et al., 2016). In short, the appropriate response is to remove the barriers to equal pay for equal work, not to abolish supply and demand.