June 6th, 2009
What is the wage penalty for working mothers when compared to women without children?
Apparently it is a big one.
While study after study focuses on the gender gap in wages, the pay gap between mothers and childless women is actually bigger than the pay gap between women and men, according to sociologist Shelley Correll, Stephen Benard, and In Paik. Their study, Getting a Job: Is There a Motherhood Penalty? received the 2008 Rosabeth Moss Kanter Award for Excellence in Work-Family Research at the World at Work conference this week in Seattle.
Using fake resumes for two equally qualified candidates–one childless, one a mom—the researchers found that the mother was 100% less likely to be hired when she applied for a position. Mothers were consistently ranked as less competent and less committed than non-moms. “They were also offered $11,000 a year less pay, on average, than an equally qualified childless candidate,” Correll says in the author interview that accompanies the award.
And what about men? Fathers got higher ratings than non-dads.
In another study, the researchers used more faux resumes to apply to 638 jobs during an 18-month period. Tracking interview requests, childless women got 2.1 times as many callbacks as mothers with similar credentials. As for the guys? There was no difference among fathers and childless men.
When asked if she was surprised by these findings, Correll, who is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology at Stanford University, says:
I was not surprised to find that mothers were discriminated against, but I was very surprised by the magnitude of the discrimination. With gender or race, we often talk about the subtle ways that stereotypes are disadvantaging. With mothers, the effects were huge, such as being about 100% less likely to be recommended for hire than childless women and being offered much lower starting salaries.
Are you as surprised or shocked by this research as I was? Does a pay gap for working moms and their childless counterparts exist in your workplace?
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Posted in Working Parents