Pay Equity - A Compensation Fairy Tale

CNN, The San Francisco Chronicle and even Harvard Business Review have been providing a warning worthy of a Grimm's Fairy Tale (the real ones not the Disney kind) that women's wages are about 80% of men's wages for comparable work. They have gone as far as walking us through the dark forrest where women with advanced degrees are in this disparate situation. My favorite tale begins with female CEOs averaging about $1,500 a week. Now, this skeptical reader begins to question the premise of this cautionary tale and wonder how many of these CEOs are running their own businesses. The scary story continues as the boss of a smaller company finds it tends to limit one's general compensation. We see frustrated women abandon banging on the glass ceiling to make their own way in business, because it beats the harrowing path of corporate politics. An entertaining twist to this tale is that media and busines professionals alike believe women make less because they leave to be mommies and lose years of increases and the experience that adds value to their resume. Diapers and bottles and brain atrophy, Oh My!
What the heck is going on out there? Any company with enough money for a lawyer is clear on the process of pay equity and how to maintain it through structured hiring practices and quartile based increase structures. There is more to this story than meets the eye or will ever be told in a newspaper, internet post or magazine article. Here is my advice, if you don't like the pay, find a better situation and go. My best increases have come from getting a new employer.