InCome Inequality

Income Inequality for Females

Sociologists have and will continue to study the factors contributing to gender income inequality. Even though cultural, sociological, and economic conditions for women in the United States have greatly improved over the last few decades, income inequality is still a fact for the majority of women in the workforce. There are many factors that contribute to this income inequality, and sociologists continue, through nomothetic and longitudinal studies, to provide further insight which, hopefully, one day may lead to further change.

The U. S. Census Bureau released the results from the annual American Community Survey on September 22, 2011, and the analysis conducted by the American Human Development Project shows how the recession affected the earnings of different groups of Americans. From 2007 to 2010, female wages fared better than male wages, as far as stability, with female wages declining by $253.00 and male wages declining by $2,433.00. Even though the gap has narrowed between median wages, males still make significantly higher wages than their female counterparts. Males with an undergraduate degree actually earn approximately $5,000.00 more than females with a graduate degree (“What Happened to Earnings”). Because of the effects of the recession, female median earnings are now closer to the median earnings of males but not because of an increase in their wages, but because of a decrease in male wages. The relative stability of female wages is, in part, due to their occupations in fields such as health care and the service sector which actually added jobs (Tavernise).

One of the factors that sociologists should continue to investigate is what effect does personality play in gender income inequality. Certain female personality traits may lead to prejudice, bias, and stereotyping. For example, studies show that women, on average, are more concerned than men with developing and maintaining positive social relationships. In fact, women who feel competitive toward others actually score lower on measures of self-esteem (Gray 555). In many corporations, this “agreeableness” is often seen as soft and non-assertive. However, this personality trait is very useful in collaboration and negotiation. While men may be prone to risk-taking and competition, women are better collaborators and better at achieving long-term results, and, in fact, companies that employ more women in upper-level management are more profitable than those that rely on male talent (Kay).

In the United States, sociologists also study the impact of