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Comment by inopinatus | Hacker News Reader

You've jumped to a conclusion the study does not appear to draw. It does not state that being a married primary caregiver correlates with a lower expected salary. It says that being a married woman with offspring correlates with a lower expected salary.

In other words that there is systematic bias against married women with children, not against all married caregivers with children.

The idea that men can be a primary caregiver still blows minds.

edit: s/leads to/correlates with/ which I agree is an important nuance but doesn't change my point.

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> It says that being a married woman with offspring leads to a lower expected salary.

No, it doesn't.

It says that there is a correlation between being a married woman with offspring and a lower expected salary.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_cau...

Furthermore, if you even had read the article you would've noticed the bit where it says "Weinberg says that the data cannot identify or tease apart factors that might explain why married women with children earn less — among the possibilities"

Okay. My point stands whether one writes "leads to" or "correlates with".

Thanks for suggesting the correction, and can I in turn suggest avoiding the phrase "if you had even read the article" in future. I'm sure you intended it to reinforce your remark, but I believe it actually tends to devalue any point it accompanies.

Small point: "if you even had read the article" and "if you had even read the article" are (imho) semantically different.

In the first the 'even' appears to mean "even in this very article, you may find this", where as in the second it appears to mean "if you at least put in the effort to read this article".

Let's not assume that correlation is causation here. One explanation is that female primary caregivers face systematic discrimination their male peers don't face.

Another is that female primary caregivers, more so than their male counterparts, lose interest in focusing on work after they have a child, and thus fall into the rut of a lower performing employee that inevitably gets paid less.

I don't know which it is. Are their studies that try to find out?

> Another is that female primary caregivers, more so than their male counterparts, lose interest in focusing on work after they have a child, and thus fall into the rut of a lower performing employee that inevitably gets paid less.

This study was looking at pay one year after receipt of PhD. I'd expect that it would usually take longer for people to start being separated by performance in the types of jobs that PhDs typically get.

Until 50% of the female marrying population want to marry a man who is willing to be the primary caregiver, this is unlikely to change, we are the product of expectations of men to women and women to men.

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