Why men make more than wormen....

It is the choices that women make that lead to lower pay...

But the real feminist complaint festival begins on Tuesday April 25th. To feminists, it’s Equal Pay Day, a pseudo-holiday when National Organization for Women and National Council of Women’s Organizations lament the disparity between men’s and women’s wages. Feminists groups claim that the first four months of the year were spent making up for last year’s gap. On April 25, women have finally earned as much as men in 2005.

There’s one problem with Equal Pay Day—the premise is bogus. Department of Labor data confirms that the median wage of a full-time working woman is three-quarters of that of a full-time working man, but like too many statistics, this fact ignores more than it reveals. This data doesn’t account for relevant factors such as occupation, experience and educational attainment.

Feminists may not like it, but the evidence shows that women’s choices—not discrimination—cause wage gap. Warren Farrell — a former board member of the National Organization for Women’s New York chapter — identifies 25 decisions that individuals make when choosing jobs in his book, Why Men Earn More. Women, he finds, are much more likely to make decisions that increase their quality of life, but decrease their pay.

Most people understand that many women often take time out of the workforce to care for family members, particularly young children. Even women who work full-time log fewer hours in the office on average than full-time working men. It is common sense that a worker who remains employed continually is going to make more than someone who drops out of the workforce for several years.

Working less is just one of the decisions women make that results in less take-home pay. Women also avoid dangerous jobs (more than nine in ten occupational deaths occur among men) and jobs that place them outdoors in the elements. Women are less willing than men to move for a job or travel frequently. Dr. Farrell’s book provides a roadmap for how individual women can increase their earnings, by making different choices, including working more hours in the office, assuming more risks or relocating for a job.