This, Alex Castellanos, is why we can’t have nice things.
From ThinkProgress:
“Now we know, at least from both of your perspectives,” Maddow said, pointing to Castellanos and Romney surrogate Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA), “women are not fairing worse than men in the economy that women aren’t getting paid less for equal work.” “It’s about policy and whether or not you want to fix some of the structural discrimination that women really do face that Republicans don’t believe is happening,” she added.
Categories: Meet the Press, Video
You provided no facts. Men work more hours then women. This accounts for about 50% of the income gap. It has a lot more to do with regarding why women are paid lower. There was a recent study that showed a group of 2,000 graduates, who worked the same job title, same duties, everything the same. Guess what the results were? EQUAL. During our economies recession, Women had a 8.3-8.5% unemployment rate, men had a 12.5% unemployment rate…..hmmmm….I would focus on the White House, regarding women’s pay. It’s 18% lower then men who work there.
Rachel was debating with a guy thay was providing the FACTS and she still ignored then and brushed them off every time. She is spreading pure lies on this topic. If it was indeed a problem, then by all means address it. But, it isn’t a problem . It’s your opinion, and that’s it. Until you provide some facts, what makes you think people will believe you? Oh wait, usually all the media has to do is say something and a lot of people will believe it without checking the credentials first. Well I feel people should know the facts. Our government lies to us enough, the media even more. I would appreciate that you provide some actual facts when talking about something. (No Pun intended)
Best Regards,
From someone who, “isn’t trying to divide our nation”
(America, we should all have locked arms, no,matter what differences we have, as in race, religion, gender, etc) . Quit letting these type of people divide our nation. Please seek the truth.
Is Rachel really telling lies about the wage discrepancy?
The U.S. Bureau of Labor is the source for figure of women being paid 77 cents on the dollar. Additionally, there are many other studies supporting it – and also studies on the very issues he raised:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gender_pay_gap
Yes, he was citing facts – but he was missing something. What he was citing were confounding variables. All of those he stated were typical variables which would be corrected for in a study. Google “confounding variables” and you can read how it is done. It most sounded like *he* is misunderstanding how confounding variables are handled. It is easy to understand how he might be confused. The science is not easy to understand. Even Wikipedia is requesting an expert on the topic to help write the article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confounding_factor
As it stands, Rachel is on the same side of the U.S. Bureau of Labor along with many studies and most people. Most people would agree that that would not be considered intentionally “spreading lies.”
Can we agree that at least on the $0.77 figure – Rachel is not spreading lies? Or at least that it would be reasonable she trusts the U.S. Bureau of Labor and the decades of research that have supported this?
Rachel, I love your show. If I miss it on TV I watch it on my computer. For the most part, I agree with your stances.
I watched last night’s show with your confrontation with Alex on the weekend show. I get his point of view. I don’t dispute that women make 77% of what men make generically but is it really a product of discrimination at a specific company or is it just facts and circumstances?
People hire in different circumstances even if the companies are right next door to each other. Consider two companies each hiring 20 accountants. One hires 15 men and 5 women and pays $1000 per week. to both men and women. The other hires 15 women and 5 men and pays each $770 per week. The gross numbers show that men get higher pay than women but in this case is that really true? There is no discrimination. Maybe the company paying the larger salary values accountants more than the other. Maybe one has a larger budget and/or is financially sounder than the other. There are so many factors that I really don’t see how you can measure this.
As far as discrimination in a given company, I agree that it is unacceptable. I fully support the Lily Ledbetter law. But until you can be more specific how this problem needs to be fixed on the individual company basis, I don’t think this is a problem worth fighting for.
As a tax preparer over 40+ years I have seen many situations. My highest paid clients and lowest paid full time clients have been women so I’m not coming from this in a vacuum. I would just like more clarification than just the generic numbers.
Hi Rachael. Caught this show. Good thing I wasn’t close enough to the dork. I am way not as gentle as you.
Note that many working folk hanker for those overtime hours. Most get paid a premium for them. That men work more of them than women may tend to confirm that the overall workplace is prejudiced. In either case, however, I do not get why the law can be permitted to deliberatly fail to support our efforts to stamp out this insidious evil, even if one were to believe (aginst all evidence) that the prejudice is rare. It didn’t help the case that the man sitting next to you was rude and insulting to you. Kind of proved your point I think.
Some of the discussion above actually makes a strong case for a written article where the complex details can be presented and argued. Trying to argue it in a TV moment without a few hours to instruct the audience in the kinds and limits of available statistics is just impossible.
Still not an excuse to interrupt a lady too gentle to shout over the interruption. Was that in fact what he was trying to get you to do? To discredit you by provoking a response?
Loved the way Rachel exercised diplomacy and grace while talking to a very condescending person. One thing I have heard about women and lower pay stems, in part, to the fact that women cost more (for private insurance health care companies) to insure. It is argued that women have greater costs for insurance due to their reproductive capabilities and the risks involved both before and after the reproductive time. While I hardly think that is a “fair reason” to lower women’s pay, I wonder if that is part of the disparity. I wonder why the “right” doesn’t talk about that as part of the reason versus just trying to deny the statistical facts. Oh wait, b/c that would raise the healthcare issue and we can’t have that. Bravo to your effort and thanks for being professional and patient in the presence of an unfortunate simpleton.