The "Grievance Industry"
18/4/14 12:26![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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talkpoliticsMany years ago, just after the end of Reagan’s first term, I was listening to a local Talk Radio host, Ronn Owens, doing a sort of “summing up” of the Reagan administration so far. He brought up Reagan’s question, “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?” and he said, “I gotta tell ya. Yes, I am. And everyone I know is better off too.”
Ronn invited his mostly white, middle-class listeners to weigh in. One after another they lined up to chirp about how well they were doing in Reagan’s America.
Then, he got a black caller, who informed the host, “I’m not better off. I’m not better off at all. In fact, things have gotten worse. And I don’t know one single black American who’s not doing worse.”
“Oh now sir,” Ronn said, with the air of someone calming down a hysteric. “don’t you feel you’re being a little myopic?”
I guess the farsighted, non-myopic approach would have been for the caller and all those other black Americans to think happy thoughts about how well Ronn Owens and the other white folks were doing, rather than focusing on their own petty concerns.
There has long been in the United States mainstream the unspoken assumption that a poor, female, gay, non-Christian or non-white person voting in his or her own interest is a form of whining rather than common sense, even though the stakes for these voters tend to be higher than the concerns of wealthy folks who don’t want to pay those extra taxes that could price them out of that second house in the Hamptons. The rule of thumb is, apparently – if you have a real grievance influencing your vote, like “I could lose my healthcare if the Republicans have their way” or “I could end up unable to afford birth control or unable to get access to an abortion” or “As a black American, I don’t want a guy who’s taking advice from Charles Murray deciding policy that’s going to affect my kids” or “My family could go hungry” or “I could end up in jail for having consensual sex with another adult” or “this guy wants to pass legislation that would endanger my right to vote” you are part of the “Grievance Industry.” And that’s a bad thing.
This attitude has recently been kicked into overdrive by the passing of ACA. The right wing is now in full panic mode over the horrifying discovery that people like being able to afford healthcare and are not going to like having that access taken away. Worse, these same people will actually vote in favor of their own physical and civic well-being. The right seems to think this is awfully unfair, and they believe it’s even more unfair for Democratic politicians to point out to these voters how much is at stake.
Joan Walsh at Salon puts it beautifully:
So let me make sure I understand. Telling your voters, accurately, that Republicans are trying to make it harder for them to vote, and are blocking action on pay equity, the minimum wage and immigration reform is unfair “grievance politics”? Likewise, any effort to deal with the scandal of $1 trillion in student loan debt? Oliphant compares it to the grievance politics practiced by Republicans under Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. But that form of grievance politics mainly relied on inflaming white voters’ fears of cultural and racial change with false or highly exaggerated claims about Democrats. (emphasis added.)
The difference between accusations that are accurate and accusations that are highly exaggerated or quite simply untrue is apparently unimportant, as far as some in the media are concerned.
I mean really, it’s all about whether or not they make people get all emotional. All that arm-waving and emoting about “I want to cast a ballot” or “I want my heart medication” or “I don’t want to end up homeless after my unemployment benefits run out” is JUST like those Republicans who said that black people were going to take over and John Kerry didn’t deserve his medals and gay people were going to kidnap your little boy and marry him. So vulgar!
Why can’t people directly affected by these policies stop horning into conversations that should really be conducted as abstract conundrums over cocktails at a DC reception?
*
Ronn invited his mostly white, middle-class listeners to weigh in. One after another they lined up to chirp about how well they were doing in Reagan’s America.
Then, he got a black caller, who informed the host, “I’m not better off. I’m not better off at all. In fact, things have gotten worse. And I don’t know one single black American who’s not doing worse.”
“Oh now sir,” Ronn said, with the air of someone calming down a hysteric. “don’t you feel you’re being a little myopic?”
I guess the farsighted, non-myopic approach would have been for the caller and all those other black Americans to think happy thoughts about how well Ronn Owens and the other white folks were doing, rather than focusing on their own petty concerns.
There has long been in the United States mainstream the unspoken assumption that a poor, female, gay, non-Christian or non-white person voting in his or her own interest is a form of whining rather than common sense, even though the stakes for these voters tend to be higher than the concerns of wealthy folks who don’t want to pay those extra taxes that could price them out of that second house in the Hamptons. The rule of thumb is, apparently – if you have a real grievance influencing your vote, like “I could lose my healthcare if the Republicans have their way” or “I could end up unable to afford birth control or unable to get access to an abortion” or “As a black American, I don’t want a guy who’s taking advice from Charles Murray deciding policy that’s going to affect my kids” or “My family could go hungry” or “I could end up in jail for having consensual sex with another adult” or “this guy wants to pass legislation that would endanger my right to vote” you are part of the “Grievance Industry.” And that’s a bad thing.
This attitude has recently been kicked into overdrive by the passing of ACA. The right wing is now in full panic mode over the horrifying discovery that people like being able to afford healthcare and are not going to like having that access taken away. Worse, these same people will actually vote in favor of their own physical and civic well-being. The right seems to think this is awfully unfair, and they believe it’s even more unfair for Democratic politicians to point out to these voters how much is at stake.
Joan Walsh at Salon puts it beautifully:
So let me make sure I understand. Telling your voters, accurately, that Republicans are trying to make it harder for them to vote, and are blocking action on pay equity, the minimum wage and immigration reform is unfair “grievance politics”? Likewise, any effort to deal with the scandal of $1 trillion in student loan debt? Oliphant compares it to the grievance politics practiced by Republicans under Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. But that form of grievance politics mainly relied on inflaming white voters’ fears of cultural and racial change with false or highly exaggerated claims about Democrats. (emphasis added.)
The difference between accusations that are accurate and accusations that are highly exaggerated or quite simply untrue is apparently unimportant, as far as some in the media are concerned.
I mean really, it’s all about whether or not they make people get all emotional. All that arm-waving and emoting about “I want to cast a ballot” or “I want my heart medication” or “I don’t want to end up homeless after my unemployment benefits run out” is JUST like those Republicans who said that black people were going to take over and John Kerry didn’t deserve his medals and gay people were going to kidnap your little boy and marry him. So vulgar!
Why can’t people directly affected by these policies stop horning into conversations that should really be conducted as abstract conundrums over cocktails at a DC reception?
*
(no subject)
Date: 20/4/14 16:59 (UTC)Err yes it does.
Unless the gender distribution of a given trade is even, that trade will weigh the average towards one side of the graph or the other. Crab fishermen are predominantly male as such fluctuations in fishing income effect the male income average more than the female. Likewise if Starbucks employees are predominantly female changes in Starbucks wages will naturally effect the female average more than the male. If (for the sake of argument) there are 2 male welders for every female welder an increase in welder's wages will have twice the effect on male average income that it does on female average income.
Seriously, this is high-school level algebra, it should be obvious and intuitive.
(no subject)
Date: 20/4/14 17:28 (UTC)No, sorry, it doesn't, as anyone who has actually compiled statistics will tell you. And no, it's not "high school algebra." Statistics are actually more complicated, as professional statisticians (including those who compile and analyze census figures) are aware.
As for male and female dominated industries, part of the problem is that the salaries tend to be higher in male dominated fields than the salaries in female dominated fields. And even within female dominated fields, women's pay tends to be less than men who work within those fields.
"Within the 20 most common occupations for women, median full-time weekly earnings for women range from $1,086 per week for ‘registered nurses’ to $379 per week for ‘cashiers’ (Table 1). Women earn less than men in each of the most common occupations for women (these calculations include full- time workers only). The gender wage gap is largest for ‘retail salespersons,’ with a gender earnings ratio for full-time work of 67.5 percent (corresponding to $234 dollars less per week for women) and for 5 ‘financial managers,’ with a ratio of 70.1 percent (corresponding to $454 less per week for women)."
A link to the PDF showing these tables can be found here:
http://www.iwpr.org/publications/pubs/the-gender-wage-gap-by-occupation-and-by-race-and-ethnicity-2013/
(no subject)
Date: 20/4/14 18:16 (UTC)Statistics are actually more complicated, as professional statisticians (including those who compile and analyze census figures) are aware.
Actually, no they aren't. It is the manipulation of statistics to support predetermined conclusions that is complicated.
To illustrate...
A cursory examination of your source and your source's source, the US Bureau of Labor Satistics, shows that the average hours for a "full-time" worker are 35.4 hours a week for women and 41.3 for men.
As such the obvious conclusion is that if women were serious about equality they'd get off their collective-asses and work more overtime. Otherwise, if we disregard time-and-a-half, "equal pay" would still result in an income ratio of approximately 86 cents on the dollar. That's most of your "Gap" right there. Oddly enough the pdf you linked makes no mention of this.
I wonder why. ;)
(no subject)
Date: 20/4/14 18:48 (UTC)It's not "shifting the goalposts" to ask you to back up your contention that the people who compiled the figures behind this graph did nothing more than compare barristas with crab fishermen.
What I had in mind was something akin to what I posted to you -- a detailed graph which, IF what you claimed was true -- would line the incomes of male crab-fishermen up next to that of female barristas and declare that evidence of male/female income disparity.
In fact, you know and I know that's not what happened.
s: A cursory examination of your source and your source's source, the US Bureau of Labor Satistics, shows that the average hours for a "full-time" worker are 35.4 hours a week for women and 41.3 for men.
Indeed. That's part of the problem, but not because women are a bunch of lazy bunnies who aren't "serious about equality" and are sitting on their "collective asses." It's because women tend to be the primary caregivers for kids. It's moms who generally end up with the kids when the dad walks, and moms have this funny thing about actually seeing their children, fixing their dinners, helping them with their homework, being home when the kid is sick, etc., etc.
That's why flexible and reasonable work hours are considered by many to be a feminist issue.
(no subject)
Date: 20/4/14 19:11 (UTC)I already did, but rather than acknowledge the touch you shifted the focus to a graph and source of your choosing. Don't get mad that I called you on it.
Indeed. That's part of the problem, but not because women are a bunch of lazy bunnies who aren't "serious about equality" and are sitting on their "collective asses." It's because women tend to be the primary caregivers for kids. It's moms who generally end up with the kids when the dad walks, and moms have this funny thing about actually seeing their children, fixing their dinners, helping them with their homework, being home when the kid is sick, etc., etc.
And if you were serious about closing the wage gap you'd be fighting tooth and nail to change this. There's no reason that fathers can not be primary caregivers more often, or for single women to not work just as much if not more than men.
Otherwise you can hardly ask employers to give special dispensation to one gender and not the other and NOT expect to see those factors reflected in wages and hiring decisions.
Anything else would be the exact opposite of equality.
(no subject)
Date: 20/4/14 19:31 (UTC)I shifted the focus to the information I'd asked you for in the first place.
paft: Indeed. That's part of the problem, but not because women are a bunch of lazy bunnies who aren't "serious about equality" and are sitting on their "collective asses." It's because women tend to be the primary caregivers for kids. It's moms who generally end up with the kids when the dad walks, and moms have this funny thing about actually seeing their children, fixing their dinners, helping them with their homework, being home when the kid is sick, etc., etc.
s: And if you were serious about closing the wage gap you'd be fighting tooth and nail to change this.
What makes you think we aren't?
s: There's no reason that fathers can not be primary caregivers more often...
All it takes is those fathers stepping up to the plate. We've been waiting for years for that to happen. Of course, doing that takes certain career sacrifices...
s: or for single women to not work just as much if not more than men.
No reason? Single parents shouldn't worry about being home at least part of the time to care for their kids? Staying home with them when they're sick? Helping them with their homework?
s: Otherwise you can hardly ask employers to give special dispensation to one gender and not the other and NOT expect to see those factors reflected in wages and hiring decisions.
I think all parents, men and women, should be given more leeway by their employers here.
You know, kind of like those Scandinavian countries we were talking about a few threads ago, where there's a strong social safety net, the average work week for both genders is 27 to 35 hours instead of forward, and people enjoy roughly one months worth of paid vacation a year, plus generous periods of paid parental leave?
Those countries you were citing as ever-so-hard-working. Remember that?
(no subject)
Date: 20/4/14 19:43 (UTC)And I provided it, not my fault you didn't like it.
What makes you think we aren't?
So I can expect prominent feminist publications and pundits to be voicing thier support for father's rights any day now yes? Or maybe holding idiot college girls responsible for thier own drunkenness?
No reason? Single parents shouldn't worry about being home at least part of the time to care for their kids? Staying home with them when they're sick? Helping them with their homework?
You already know the answer to this. Now is the moment to demonstrate the courage of your convictions. (http://talk-politics.livejournal.com/1851460.html?thread=146070084#t146070084)
Seems to me you want all the privilege and none of the culpability, in the end how does that make you any different from the "sexists" you claim to oppose?
(no subject)
Date: 20/4/14 21:58 (UTC)Feminists have and will continue to voicing support for better parental leave policies, more reasonable hours and safter working conditions for both parents.
s: Or maybe holding idiot college girls responsible for thier own drunkenness?
What? Is this some obllique complaint about men being prosecuted for date rape?
s: You already know the answer to this.
Indeed I do. I know the correct answer is, "yes, a single parent, male or female, needs to be home and available to the kids at least part of the time, and our employment policies should reflect that reality."
The question is, what is YOUR answer? And linking back to my OP doesn't qualify as a substantive response.
s: Seems to me you want all the privilege and none of the culpability
What have I said to indicate this?
And by the way, I'm curious. Have you changed your mind about those "hardworking" Scandanavians?
(no subject)
Date: 21/4/14 00:01 (UTC)Color me surprised, but otherwise happy to hear it.
What? Is this some oblique complaint about men being prosecuted for date rape?
Yes. Advocates of the "rape culture" hypothesis have made great strides eroding due process protections for men. What I am implying is that female defendants should be subject to the same standards (or lack there of) as their male counter-parts.
Equality means equal levels of moral / social culpability, and above all equality in the eyes of the law.
Indeed I do. I know the correct answer is, "yes, a single parent, male or female, needs to be home and available to the kids at least part of the time, and our employment policies should reflect that reality."
...and if that means fewer working hours, they should accept the hit to their income that entails. Equal pay for equal work is the goal is it not?
What have I said to indicate this?
See above, do you want equal pay for equal work or don't you? If equality is not your goal, you need to be upfront about it.
and no I have not changed my mind about Scandinavians. Why? Are they not running a surplus anymore?
(no subject)
Date: 21/4/14 17:13 (UTC)You keep making pronouncements about women's issues that reveal just how ignorant you are about them.
paft: What? Is this some oblique complaint about men being prosecuted for date rape?
s: Yes. Advocates of the "rape culture" hypothesis have made great strides eroding due process protections for men.
"Rape culture" isn't a "hypothesis." It's reality, and it's one many women after a certain age are painfully conscious of.
s: What I am implying is that female defendants should be subject to the same standards (or lack there of) as their male counter-parts.
So the victim should be put on trial as well?
Look, I'm no fan of any effort to throw out due process. I was speaking up about it during the '90s during the child molestation scare, and I hold no brief for how the prosecutors handled the Duke Lacrosse case. But the fact remains, I've known quite a few women who were raped. One was a college friend who drank too much, passed out, and awoke realizing that someone had raped her while she was unconscious. Another was drugged at a friends house and raped . One was grabbed just a few feet from her front door and raped in her yard...
Rape as a crime is pretty prevalent, as is the tendency to put the onus on the victim rather than the rapist. (My friend who was raped at the party was afraid to tell report it. If her father had found out what happened, he would have beaten her.)
s: ...and if that means fewer working hours, they should accept the hit to their income that entails. Equal pay for equal work is the goal is it not?
Well, first of all, that "hit in income" is part of what makes poverty so prevalent among single mothers. It's not just a matter of mom not being able to shop at Whole Foods. It's a matter of working mothers being sometimes unable to afford to put food on the table.
As for equal pay for equal work, I've not heard any feminists advocating that the working hours accomodations they request only apply to single mothers. Single fathers would benefit also.
s: and no I have not changed my mind about Scandinavians. Why? Are they not running a surplus anymore?
And yet, they have a strong social safety net, incredibly generous parental leave policies, much longer vacations, and a shorter work week than Americans.
How do you account for this?
(no subject)
Date: 22/4/14 05:18 (UTC)If that is what it means to "face your accuser" then yes.
Are you prepared to bet ruining an innocent person's life on less?
Rape as a crime is pretty prevalent
Not nearly as prevalent as some seem to think and even IF it were to define it as a womens' issue is disingenuous. The oft quoted 9 in 10 statistic dates back to 1995 when sexual assault was still defined specifically as a crime against women and minors.
Well, first of all, that "hit in income" is part of what makes poverty so prevalent among single mothers.
Work more, get paid more, work less, get paid less.
your point is?
How do you account for this?
I've explained this to you repeatedly but for someone who complains about others "lack of nuance" you seem to have a lot of trouble parsing simple conditional statements.
As far as I know, (see according to the IMF) Norway, Sweden, and the other Scandinavian countries run an economic surplus with very little external debt. This is actually one of the "positive cultural traits" that the Spirit Level cited.
To put this in as simple "non-jargony" terms as possible, their governments have disposable income.
IF the government of some country or another wants to spend their disposable income on domestic programs instead of say building a huge-ass particle collider or fighting world hunger, that is their prerogative. I am not a Scandinavian tax-payer and thus have no stake in the matter.
HOWEVER This is predicated on having money to spare in the first place. Which the US government DOES NOT
The US government spends way more than it takes in, the opposite of "surpluss", and the majority of most of our debts are external rather than internal.
Again to put this in as simple "non-jargony" terms as possible. we are running out of money and our credit rating sucks.
As such we need to EITHER cut back our expenditures till we have a surplus. OR deal with rampant inflation and/or shortages.
And before you even suggest it...
No we can't just tax our way out of it because with our current debt ratio you would need to tax everyone not in the bottom 1% at the maximum allowed tax rate to even make a dent. Even if we restricted ourselves to "the rich" simply confiscating the income and assets of the upper "73 Percent" (what it would actually take to square the circle) is simply not a realistic solution.
TLDR
How do I account for this? Easily, they have the time and the money to spare and we don't.
(no subject)
Date: 22/4/14 15:25 (UTC)No, it's not what it means to "face your accuser." Nor does "face your accuser" mean that the victim is treated as being as culpable as the accused.
s: Not nearly as prevalent as some seem to think...
And much more prevalent that many others seem to think. Women past a certain age are usually pretty aware of how prevalent because "rape" has ceased to be something that happens to someone else you've never met. Either you've had friends who experienced it, or you've had at least one narrow escape, or you've experienced it yourself.
s: Work more, get paid more, work less, get paid less.
There are single mothers working two jobs who still are unable to pay for basic necessities. That's not a reflection of how much they work. It's a reflection of how little they are paid.
s: To put this in as simple "non-jargony" terms as possible, their governments have disposable income.
And how have they managed this with their generous social safety nets and shorter work hours?
(no subject)
Date: 22/4/14 20:54 (UTC)Innocent until proven guilty REQUIRES us to consider all accusations against a specific person false until proven otherwise. Anything else would be a legal paradox, not to mention violation of due process and basic rights guarenteed by the US Constitution.
I ask again, Are you, Paft, prepared to stake ruining an innocent person's life on less?
And much more prevalent that many others seem to think.
Yes, but i think you'd be surprised if you knew who the victims were.
There are single mothers working two jobs who still are unable to pay for basic necessities.
And?
And how have they managed this with their generous social safety nets and shorter work hours?
We've been over (http://talk-politics.livejournal.com/1830965.html?thread=145203765#t145203765) this (http://talk-politics.livejournal.com/1838915.html?thread=145434947#t145434947) before (http://talk-politics.livejournal.com/1851460.html?thread=146111300#t146111300).
(no subject)
From:(no subject)
Date: 21/4/14 18:20 (UTC)Really, like what?
(no subject)
Date: 21/4/14 20:15 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 21/4/14 22:53 (UTC)That isn't true.
and undermining the accused's 6th amendment rights (specifically the right to be informed of the charges and evidence leveled against them, and the right to confront their accuser) out of some misguided effort to spare the victim.
And neither is that.
(no subject)
Date: 22/4/14 04:48 (UTC)Jeff already linked the article I was going to, so I will just leave you with this unhappy thought...
for each one exonerated (http://www.innocenceproject.org/) there is another who would, if this were just world, take their place for bearing false witness.
Unfortunately this is not a just world.
(no subject)
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Date: 21/4/14 20:29 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 21/4/14 21:16 (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 22/4/14 00:23 (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 22/4/14 00:37 (UTC)I missed that specific part of the graph as well. I thought it was the wrong image link at first, but nope.
(no subject)
Date: 22/4/14 05:02 (UTC)I just explained why doing so is mathematically fallacious and misleading but apparently expecting numerical literacy and the ability to parse basic logic from the general population is a bridge too far.
(no subject)
Date: 22/4/14 05:35 (UTC)I'm unstung.
It's in the damn legend of the graph, and in the wiki article it links to
No it's not; and your link goes to the President's website. And some oblique reference to a Wikipedia "Gender pay gap" is pretty much a zero (and for what its worth, that section of the "gender pay gap" also clearly states there is an unexplained pay gap for women and some studies have shown discrimination could be a factor and in fact comparing apples to apples found examples of wage differences due to discrimination, but nothing mentioned about crab fisherman and barristas.
(no subject)
Date: 22/4/14 06:34 (UTC)If I had been trying to burn you I would have done so in the form of a silly .gif, preferably one with sparkles.
That said you do read english, don't you?
"US women's weekly earnings as a percentage of men's"
In a world where all trades paid the same, or the genders were equally distributed between trades, "women's weekly earnings as a percentage of men" might come close meaning something. But we don't live in that world so it doesn't.
Barristas and crab fishermen were simply one example out of many. I could have just as easily used school-teachers and auto mechanics, or any other 2 occupations with a lop-sided gender distribution to illustrate the same point.
Namely that Apples != Oranges.
ETA:
Using paft's own source cited here (http://talk-politics.livejournal.com/1851460.html?thread=146066500#t146066500), the average gap, once you start comparing apples to apples is actually less than 5%.
Maybe the president should get his own house in order (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2014/04/09/how-the-white-house-and-democrats-stepped-on-their-own-equal-pay-message/) before he starts telling others how they should run theirs.
(no subject)
Date: 22/4/14 15:08 (UTC)As if that's the only way you could do it. SO limiting!
That said you do read english [sic], don't you?
Case in point, But to answer your query: Why sure I do! Every day, I speak, read, sing, recite poetry and reenact episodes of Games of Thrones--all of it in English.
Barristas and crab fishermen were simply one example out of many. I could have just as easily used school-teachers and auto mechanics, or any other 2 occupations with a lop-sided gender distribution to illustrate the same point.
You didn't illustrate the point though did you? Particularly in your original comment since you made no explanation and just posted a graph, with absolutely no explanation or context or anything else. So naturally you're going to be asked some follow-ups.
Using paft's own source cited here, the average gap, once you start comparing apples to apples is actually less than 5%.
No, Paft's source says a lot more you've deliberately left out. But let's take your comment at face value. 95 percent is NOT 100 percent. The graph (nor does your "linked" article suggest this). And guess what, your own Wikipedia "linked" article (you never provided a link) in the section mentions an overall 7 percent wage difference, with up to 16 percent between CFO/CEOS (http://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/aug/31/cmi-equal-pay-report)(and you can't get more apples-to-apples than that).