Open your eyes, there is a glass ceiling among us. For those of you who don’t know what a glass ceiling is an intangible barrier within a hierarchy that prevents women or minorities from obtaining upper-level positions.
In layman’s terms, it's when a working class woman gets to a certain job level entry and can’t progress to the upper rungs of the corporate ladder, regardless of their qualifications or achievements, unlike the working class man that keeps going through the glass ceiling surpassing it with no problem.
It's like the huge elephant in the room that everyone knows it's there but chooses to ignore.
Traditionally, in the American culture, women have been considered mainly responsible for domesticity and nurture. For a long time it has been the thought that men “take charge” and women “take care.” But this way of thinking should've been forgotten a long time ago. Women started to further their education and obtain a career to support themselves and their family. In fact, during the last decade, it has become more aware of the value of women bring to the workplace, and the contribution to the economy at large.
So why is it that, women still get paid less than men even with the same qualifications? Maybe it’s due to the stereotypical beliefs that women aren’t born leaders or the assumption that women may bear children at any given moment, so it’s better to give a promotion to the man because it’s "more beneficial for the company’s budget expenses for the company than for them hire a temporary replacement for a woman’s six weeks leave."
Many women have made the argument that the work they do isn't as valued as the work done by men. These women often find themselves competing in the never-ending race for recognition with their male co workers even if it's just for a measly thumbs up. Researchers from Cornell University have given their argument more plausibility. Their study found that wages decline when women enter a business in large numbers although the women are doing exactly the same jobs previously held by men, according to The New York Times.
"I found many times my contributions had to be significantly larger than my male counterparts to merit a public ‘good job’ in front of various audiences,” shared Jenny Dorsey, professional chef and culinary consultant at Jenny Dorsey Consulting, to Forbes BrandVoice.
But what I found particularly surprising is that there is not only a huge wage gap between women in the workplace but also in professional sports.
Which brings me to another important question. What separate’s men’s sports from women?
We grew up in a society where a majority of us were taught that male sports were dominant and more interesting to watch and we just kind of accepted it. So it shouldn't come as a bombshell that the revenue for women's sports is far less than it is compared to men's sports. Many professional women's sports initiatives are set up to fail because they don't have enough support from the beginning. Sponsors set up shop for a year or two, then bolt when they don't see immediate returns, which then forces the teams or leagues into survival mode.
In women's cycling, for example, one of the world's top-ranked teams, with ten Olympians on the roster, turned to crowd funding going into the 2015 season. It raised about $100,000, out of its stated $700,000 goal.
In this case, this outrage, shouldn't be focused on why women get paid less in general but instead be focused on the lack of support for women's sports and the stereotypes that follow in the workplace. If someone were to ask me if the glass ceiling exists, I'll say it only exists because we created it.
If you paid close attention reading this article, there's one common factor in the equation, that could be the solution to the problem. It's the standards of society. Women have been fighting for decades, centuries, to be seen as equals to men both on the playing field and off of it.
As a woman writing this, I don't want you, or myself to ever hit the glass ceiling. We deserve to progress in the career we're in if we have the same qualifications as the next male applicant. If we cannot change our mentality as a whole, then we have no hope. If we cannot forget about all the stereotypes and everything that society influenced us, we cannot truly bid farewell to unequal pay for women.
I just hope to see this change in my lifetime.
