Senate Democrats pay female staffers less than male staffers

[OmaHusker]

A group of Democratic female senators on Wednesday declared war on the so-called “gender pay gap,” urging their colleagues to pass the aptly named Paycheck Fairness Act when Congress returns from recess next month. However, a substantial gender pay gap exists in their own offices, a Washington Free Beacon analysis of Senate salary data reveals.

Of the five senators who participated in Wednesday’s press conference—Barbara Mikulski (D., Md.), Patty Murray (D., Wash.), Debbie Stabenow (D., Mich.), Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.) and Barbara Boxer (D., Calif.)—three pay their female staff members significantly less than male staffers.

Washington Free Beacon

How can we take these Senators seriously?

[OmaHusker]

After the Lilly Ledbetter Act passed in Congress and was signed into law, President Obama and Senate Democrats were self-congratulatory.

“We passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act -- the first bill I signed -- so that equal pay for equal work is a reality all across this country," Obama said, praising himself and his colleagues. "We are very proud of legislation we have passed … to guarantee gender pay equity with the Lilly Ledbetter law," Democratic senator Ben Cardin said, offering himself and Democrats more praise. Senator Jeanne Shaheen, also a Democrat, likewise offered congratulations to herself: "I am proud of what we have been able to accomplish so far… the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which ensures that all Americans are paid the same regardless of age, gender, race, or ethnicity."

Nevertheless, with an election coming in November and with Republicans supposedly waging a war on women, the pay equity Lilly Ledbetter bill does not appear to have been enough--even for these very same Democrats.

The next battle on Capitol Hill for Democrats will again be to use this women's issue for political gain.

One wonders, of course, if the Lilly Ledbetter bill was so great, why would they need to do this drill all over again?

It's a way to raise support and funds, a senior Senate Republican aide explains. And it's cynical and destructive.

Weekly Standard

[Chi-Town Cube]

Washington Free Beacon

How can we take these Senators seriously?

I'm still struggling with trying to take that website you linked to seriously.

Did you sign up for "Freedom Mail"

There are so many holes in that "article" I don't know where to begin. First, you would need to see exactly who is holding what position and what the said salary is for that position. You would have to have a male and female holding the same position with the same relative experience for the same period of time to even begin to scratch the surface.

The fact that this "reference" did the statistical work themselves is itself humorous. Sort of like the tobacco industry doing smoking healthcare research.

There are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Even lower than that is political statistics.

Let's get back to real issues like the Obama birth certificate.

[OmaHusker]

I'm still struggling with trying to take that website you linked to seriously.

Did you sign up for "Freedom Mail"

There are so many holes in that "article" I don't know where to begin. First, you would need to see exactly who is holding what position and what the said salary is for that position. You would have to have a male and female holding the same position with the same relative experience for the same period of time to even begin to scratch the surface.

The fact that this "reference" did the statistical work themselves is itself humorous. Sort of like the tobacco industry doing smoking healthcare research.

There are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Even lower than that is political statistics.

Let's get back to real issues like the Obama birth certificate.

Is there a gender gap in regards to pay?

[Chi-Town Cube]

Is there a gender gap in regards to pay?

Once again, you would have to control the "study" for position, age, experience, etc. The "article" pays lip service to such controls, but then just resumes the expected dross.

In terms of gender gap in regards to pay outside the walls of congress, I haven't a clue. I would have to look up the data and I don't have time right now and frankly don't have much of a desire to.

In terms of Congress getting involved, I would prefer they didn't.

[OmaHusker]

I'm still struggling with trying to take that website you linked to seriously.

Did you sign up for "Freedom Mail"

There are so many holes in that "article" I don't know where to begin. First, you would need to see exactly who is holding what position and what the said salary is for that position. You would have to have a male and female holding the same position with the same relative experience for the same period of time to even begin to scratch the surface.

The fact that this "reference" did the statistical work themselves is itself humorous. Sort of like the tobacco industry doing smoking healthcare research.

There are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Even lower than that is political statistics.

Let's get back to real issues like the Obama birth certificate.

Once again, you would have to control the "study" for position, age, experience, etc. The "article" pays lip service to such controls, but then just resumes the expected dross.

In terms of gender gap in regards to pay outside the walls of congress, I haven't a clue. I would have to look up the data and I don't have time right now and frankly don't have much of a desire to.

In terms of Congress getting involved, I would prefer they didn't.

No source is sacrosanct but if you're going to refute one, you have to back it up with something better than casual dismissal.

[Chi-Town Cube]

No source is sacrosanct but if you're going to refute one, you have to back it up with something better than casual dismissal.

No source is sacrosanct, but implicit to any "research" is the assumption of an unbiased or at least minimally biased source.

This source is completely biased as evidenced by the rest of the website. They did not publish how they calculated this "pay gap" and therefore their methods could be, and probably are, flawed. Reading the article, it seems they just took the males and females on each staff and just took a mean pay between the two. That is, in itself, a completely inappropriate statistical analysis. As I mentioned previously, a controlled look at gender pay differences would have to control for age, experience, and position at a bare minimum. Even this highly biased publication says that most chiefs of staff are male and assuming they are the highest paid person on a congressional staff, that alone would skew and mean data toward the male side.

OK, lets go to their source Legistorm and look at what Diane Feinstein and Patty Murray pay their "Legislative Correspondent" and "Legislative Aide" respectively, for example.

Between the two staffs, there are 8 men and 8 women with that position title. On the columns below you will see the salaries of the sixteen individuals holding those position titles segregated by sex.

Women Men

18299.56	18545.01
18999.96	21352.44
18999.96	13284.3
17374.95	18999.96
18499.92	15358.3
18999.96	18166.6
17499.96	16249.92
5362.5	2672.61

The mean female salary is $16,753, the mean male salary is $15,578. Using a simple student's t-test comparing continuous data, the P-value is 0.6604 which indicates that there is no difference between the salary of the male population and the female population holding the same position.

Obviously, this rudimentary analysis I just did is a small sample size, but I hope the point comes across. That point being this "source" and story is nothing more than a cherry-picked hatchet job with has not a grain of truth behind it.

I just wasted a half an hour of my time

[Chi-Town Cube]

To follow-up, what drives me freaking nuts about our political system is the casual nature in which facts and logic are completely thrown in the wastebasket and replaced by gross distortions and out-and-out deception.

It boggles my mind that people would rather fudge/cherrypick/make up data (made up as in this "article") to support their "cause" rather than have an honest, intellectual discussion about the problems that face our country and the solutions that are available.

The fact that we even need a website solely devoted to paring out the overt lies in our political discourse is pathetic.

[Pops]

And then there goes another Dem bashing thread down the drain......damn it!

[RedPhoenix]

Gleaming the Cube!

[Nebraska1]

They're all bastards. It's just that the democrats are my bastards.

[Husker Mort]

They're all bastards. It's just that the democrats are my bastards.

+1

[Chi-Town Cube]

I'm just waiting for Oma to come defend the sacrosanctity of the Washington Free Beacon............

[Warhorse]

I'm waiting for Limbaugh to rush in and call all the female staffers "whores" because they take any salary at all.

[Nishioka]

The mean female salary is $16,753, the mean male salary is $15,578.

"There's a war against men in this country" in 5...4...3...

[OmaHusker]

For fiscal year 2011, Sen. Feinstein's full-time Legal Correspondents were paid as follows:

	Period 1	Period 2	Period 1	Period 2
Juliana Marie Goldrosen			19,042.11	17,908.02
Sarah K. Moore			18,999.96	18,999.96
Alison Rosner-Hyman			18,299.56
Estee C. Sepulveda			18,999.96	18,999.96
Patricia Beltran				21,349.92
Alan D. Lightfeldt		21,349.92
Joseph Jankiewicz	18,999.96	18,999.96
Daniel B. Saphire (Dan)	21,352.44	21,352.44
Deran K. Atamian		20,043.18

The average male salary was $20,349.65 and the average female salary was $19,074.93, a 6.2% difference.

[RedPhoenix]

I love it when they keep digging.....

[Inflation]

For fiscal year 2011, Sen. Feinstein's full-time Legal Correspondents were paid as follows:

	Period 1	Period 2	Period 1	Period 2
Juliana Marie Goldrosen			19,042.11	17,908.02
Sarah K. Moore			18,999.96	18,999.96
Alison Rosner-Hyman			18,299.56
Estee C. Sepulveda			18,999.96	18,999.96
Patricia Beltran				21,349.92
Alan D. Lightfeldt		21,349.92
Joseph Jankiewicz	18,999.96	18,999.96
Daniel B. Saphire (Dan)	21,352.44	21,352.44
Deran K. Atamian		20,043.18

The average male salary was $20,349.65 and the average female salary was $19,074.93, a 6.2% difference.

So 5 women staffer's are paid $152,599.45 in periods 1 and 2, for an average of $30,519.89.
And, 4 male staffer's are paid $122,097.90 in periods 1 and 2, for an average of $30,524.48.

[redmachine]

I'm failing to understand what importance any of this has.

[Chi-Town Cube]

For fiscal year 2011, Sen. Feinstein's full-time Legal Correspondents were paid as follows:

	Period 1	Period 2	Period 1	Period 2
Juliana Marie Goldrosen			19,042.11	17,908.02
Sarah K. Moore			18,999.96	18,999.96
Alison Rosner-Hyman			18,299.56
Estee C. Sepulveda			18,999.96	18,999.96
Patricia Beltran				21,349.92
Alan D. Lightfeldt		21,349.92
Joseph Jankiewicz	18,999.96	18,999.96
Daniel B. Saphire (Dan)	21,352.44	21,352.44
Deran K. Atamian		20,043.18

The average male salary was $20,349.65 and the average female salary was $19,074.93, a 6.2% difference.

I agree with redmachine that this really is a stupid thread. It was started with biased, misleading information from an obviously biased source.

I really cannot believe that you are trying to salvage this.......

Moving on......