9 statistics Patricia Arquette needs to read on gender wage gap myth

On Sunday, millions of viewers were witnesses to the 87th annual Academy Awards, a three-hour event imbibed by Hollywood liberal elites talking about political issues, even though it’s an entertainment awards show. These celebrated figures pontificate on issues like gay marriage, income inequality and the gender pay gap myth.

The final topic generated worldwide headlines because Oscar winner Patricia Arquette mentioned it in her acceptance speech for the motion picture “Boyhood.”

“It’s our time to have wage equality once and for all, and equal rights for women in the United States of America,” said Arquette, who garnered loud applause and cheers from the audience. It was reported that Meryl Streep and Jennifer Lopez were seen cheering her remarks.

It’s quite laughable when these affluent, elitists talk about these matters.

First, Hollywood actors really have no clue about income inequality and supposed pay gaps. Jennifer Lawrence grabbed headlines because she was being paid five percent of “The Hustle” profits instead of the 10 percent that Christian Bale and Bradley Cooper received. So instead of receiving $10 million, she got $5 million (boohoo); she’s still worth $34 million. This issue can be discussed here.

Second, Hollywood actors tend to avoid facts that dispute their line of thinking. Arquette is a perfect example because she cited a fallacious issue that has been refuted time after time. Perhaps she just listened to a guest on MSNBC say something once and she refrained from researching the matter any further.

Who knows?

To make life easier for Arquette – we really understand that these multi-million-dollar stars have tough lives – here are nine statistics that she needs to read on the gender wage gap myth:

1. Economist Thomas Sowell discovered that a majority of the pay gap originates from marital status. In other words, when the data is compared amongst genders who happen to have the same education, career, hours and marital status then there is no pay gap.

2. A study comprised of individuals between 27 and 33, who were never married and had no children, only had a pay gap of +/- two cents.

3. A University of Chicago study noted that men were a lot more likely to negotiate their starting salaries and pay than women.

4. The same study reported that twice as many women felt nervous about negotiating their wages.

5. Another study in the same area found men are generally a lot more aggressive about their salaries than women.

6. Men tend to take on heavy labor and masculine industries with long hours, while women will take on more subdued occupations with flexible time. This is called the danger wage premium, which means men will take on physically demanding and dangerous jobs that come with higher pay. In other words, women work in different industries that pay less (social work, early childhood education and psychology, for instance).

7. For the average woman’s lifetime, she will work fewer hours than her male counterpart. This could be due to a variety of factors: women taking maternity leave or exiting the labor force for a few years. Once a woman leaves the workforce for an extended period of time then her skills diminish and fall behind.

8. The unemployment rate for men is just under one percent higher than women (where is the outcry?).

9. Any type of pay gap for all work – not specific work – is quickly closing to 84 percent.

Despite the abundance of evidence to contradict this myth, why is still being given the light of day? Time magazine wrote something interesting about this last summer:

“Why do these reckless claims have so much appeal and staying power? For one thing, there is a lot of statistical illiteracy among journalists, feminist academics and political leaders. There is also an admirable human tendency to be protective of women—stories of female exploitation are readily believed, and vocal skeptics risk appearing indifferent to women’s suffering. Finally, armies of advocates depend on ‘killer stats’ to galvanize their cause. But killer stats obliterate distinctions between more and less serious problems and send scarce resources in the wrong directions. They also promote bigotry. The idea that American men are annually enslaving more than 100,000 girls, sending millions of women to emergency rooms, sustaining a rape culture and cheating women out of their rightful salary creates rancor in true believers and disdain in those who would otherwise be sympathetic allies.”

Ugh. On Apr. 8 we will celebrate Equal Pay Day, a time when people will refuse to look at the data that dispels much of their purported “facts.”

Let’s hope Arquette donates much of her salary to those underprivileged female workers on filmsets that earn less. If the makeup girl is earning $30 per hour, but the director is earning $5 million for a picture then Arquette better donate most of her salary to make up for this gap. They’re all hypocrites, like Neil Patrick Harris who joked the Oscars is racist because most nominees were white, but he certainly didn’t step aside to give his spot to a black, Hispanic or Asian person.