I'm not sure that there's much of a problem here that needs fixing. According to BLS, in 2004 there were 6,365,000 civilian government employees in the US, 45.7 of whom were female. Here's a detailed breakdown:
In 2004, the non-institutionalized, civilian population was 50.7% female and the civilian workforce was 46.5% female. So, compared to the total civilian workforce, women are slightly overrepresented in the government and, compared to the population, they are slightly underrepresented. I just don't see that there's much to be accomplished by quota hiring.
This is especially true since there are at least two costs to quota hiring. First, although there are things that the government must do that the private sector is forbidden (taking land without consent, killing, armed raids into homes, etc.), there isn't a sufficient trade-off here to compensate for having the government discriminate against men. In fact, since private citizens have at least a notional right of association and the government doesn't, having the government discriminate and the private sector forbidden to discriminate is backwards.
Second, quotas in practice mean that the best person is not chosen for each job. Incompetent public servants impose costs on the rest of us. Dealing with the government is unpleasant and costs more. Those costs hit women as much as men. In fact, because women are a greater percentage of the population, they hit women more often then men. So government hiring quotas (like all quotas) will harm those they are meant to aid.
34 comments:
Incompetent public servants impose costs on the rest of us.
Hard to believe they could be any more incompetent than they are now. :-)
The posted chart is a red herring, and would get you thrown out of any EEOC hearing. Comparing the numbers of female secretaries to the numbers of male department heads, and deciding that since there are equal numbers, there's gender equality, is exactly the kind of raw deal that I am asserting ought to be beneath America.
Let us instead assess the gender equality of President Bush's Cabinet.
There are currently 15 executive departments, plus the V.P., plus 5 other "Cabinet Rank" members, for a total of 20 appointed and 1 elected persons serving. We shall ignore the V.P., since the holder of that office is directly endorsed by the electorate.
Cabinet positions are considered to be among the very top political and government jobs that one can aspire to; in fact, people often resign from Congress to accept a Cabinet position.
Of the 20 "mover and shaker" positions available, men fill 15 of them, and women 5. That strikes me as dramatically unbalanced.
Further, among the 5 most powerful positions, (State, Defense, Justice, Treasury, White House Chief of Staff), there is but one woman.
[T]here isn't a sufficient trade-off here to compensate for having the government discriminate against men.
As I have established, the gov't discriminates against women, so reversing that bias is simply righting a wrong.
But if you think that the current situation is fine and unbiased, then on what grounds could you condemn a Presidential Cabinet that consisted of 15 women and 5 men ?
Turn-about is fair play, right, so such a situation couldn't be called "discrimination against men", without acknowledging that the current situation is unhealthy and worthy of change.
Quotas in practice mean that the best person is not chosen for each job.
As Bret notes, and as I have argued in the original post at the Duck, to which you've linked, almost no gov't positions are filled on the basis of "who's best", but merely "who's good enough".
That is the exact same dynamic that we find in business, and the military too, so it's our society's dominant paradigm.
Given that, I would expect to find no difference whatsoever in service by the gov't, if half of all appointees were female.
Further, according to the data that you've presented, nearly half of all gov't employees are female, which you've argued means that they're fairly represented, and you didn't argue that having so many women publicly employed is degrading public services.
So you can hardly argue that if we shifted the composition of the gov't workforce, to put more men in menial positions and more women in executive postions, that it would create greater incompetency. Doing so would gut your assertion that women are getting a fair shake.
Here is the fundamental flaw in your logic —As I have established, the gov't discriminates against women, so reversing that bias is simply righting a wrong.—
The government has done no such thing. Individuals have done it. One can see this error again here
—on what grounds could you condemn a Presidential Cabinet that consisted of 15 women and 5 men ?—
It is the President who has condemned himself, not anyone or anything else.
What you really want is to elect a different citizenry, which seems a bit much.
Individuals ought not be allowed to discriminate, either, and in many areas of life it's illegal for them to so do.
If men want the company of other men, let them join a health club, not the gov't.
It is the President who has condemned himself, not anyone or anything else.
The Senate confirms Cabinet appointments.
But you seem to be acknowledging that discrimination exists - what should be done to end it ?
And what would be wrong with a Cabinet of 15 women and 5 men, or even 20 women ?
what should be done to end it ?
As opposed to any other reform which we could spend our limited resources of time and energy on? Particularly at the level you want to target. You're telling me, for example, that the thing most wrong with the CIA on 9/11 was the fact that it was headed by a man.
You're telling me, for example, that the thing most wrong with the CIA on 9/11 was the fact that it was headed by a man.
Would you mind pointing out anything that I've written which could support such an interpretation ?
Besides, that the highest levels of gov't are hostile to women is an evil in and of itself; no further examples of specific harm are necessary.
However, we should note that with regard to 9/11, failures at the FBI were at least as critical as failures at the CIA, and possibly more so, since the FBI could have stopped the 9/11 plot cold, in the middle of August, 2001.
Further, out of the FBI's 9/11 debacle there emerged one admirable person, a female, and two extreme incompetents, both male: Coleen Rowley, Dave Frasca, who was the head of the FBI’s Radical Fundamentalist Unit, and RFU Supervisory Special Agent Mike Maltbie.
O: You really need to step back and think this through.
First, you haven't shown that there is systematic discrimination against women, either in government hiring or promotions. The only evidence we have is my chart showing that women make up a greater proportion of the government workforce than of the civilian workforce generally. In fact, if we ignore "justice" functions (I assume mostly law enforcement) women make up 53% of the government workforce.
Second, focusing on 20 political nominees is completely irrelevant. You can't tell anything from the sex ratio of 20 people who, by definition, are outliers. No one takes a job with the federal government with the goal of becoming a cabinet officer. Even if 20 were a number from which any conclusion could be drawn, you would need to look at the 30 top civil servants.
Third, I would have no problem with 20 women cabinet officers -- if they were all Condoleeza Rice. One Madeleine Albright, on the other hand, is one woman too many, as is one Warren Christopher.
Fourth, finally, and most importantly, I do not believe, as you seem to imply, that women are inherently less capable than men at government work. What I do believe is that a workforce chosen on the grounds of competence and efficiency is going to be more competent and more efficient than a workforce chosen on other grounds. It's all well and good to joke about the benefits of an incompetent government -- and I agree when it comes to the politicians that distraction and roadblock is better for the country. But in the bureaucracy, incompetence wastes time and money.
For example, the RMV in Massachusetts is a pleasure to deal with, more efficient and more pleasant than most private companies I do business with. It is highly automated, you can do most business over the web and, when you do have to go to an RMV office, you can check wait times online. At the RMV, the line moves quickly and efficiently. It's nuts to suggest that we would be better off if the RMV had not improved customer service dramatically but a strict gender quota was enforced. For what it's worth, the Registrar is a woman. She's doing an excellent job.
In trying to find out more about the most senior civil servants (the people who secretly run our government), I was amused to see this.
—Individuals ought not be allowed to discriminate—
Ah. I completely disagree with this statement and I don't see how you can consider that the basis for any libertarian view.
—But you seem to be acknowledging that discrimination exists - what should be done to end it ?—
Nothing. The cure is far worse than the disease.
—And what would be wrong with a Cabinet of 15 women and 5 men, or even 20 women ?—
The same thing that's wrong with a Cabinet of 15 men and 5 women, or even 20 men. You're the one who thinks there is a problem.
Also, in the real world, the idea that it's illegal to discriminate is laughable. It's illegal in many cases to have an incorrect number of politically privileged ethnicities. It is also legally mandatory to discriminate in many situations. Further, your entire argument is premised on doing that in even more cases. For instance, unless the President's choices for Cabinet Secretaries happens to have the specified gender ratio (very unlikely, just like it's unlikely to 20 coin flips to have exactly 10 heads and tails), then your rule will require gender discrimination.
Second, focusing on 20 political nominees is completely irrelevant. You can't tell anything from the sex ratio of 20 people who, by definition, are outliers. No one takes a job with the federal government with the goal of becoming a cabinet officer.
As I wrote here, I'm not focused on civil servant positions, but explicitly on patronage and appointed positions.
So those aren't outliers, they're the target.
[F]inally, and most importantly, I do not believe, as you seem to imply, that women are inherently less capable than men at government work.
As I wrote here, in response to I suspect one of the reasons why calling for quotas in government for [various oppressed groups] is so common is that most folks deep down see public service as perfectly suited to the dull, passive, unimaginative and mediocre and don’t think it matters much who is in the position:
"[In] America, the vast majority of people are dull, passive, unimaginative, and mediocre, (which I can prove, based on polls and simple logic), and therefore the vast majority of people in public service also have those same qualities. Further, in America bureaucratic public service is seen as a safe but fairly limited career option, so vivacious, active, imaginative, and stellar people tend to go into other fields, where the rewards are greater for those who are very successful.
"Also, since the vast majority of Americans possess the qualities that you mention, and since the vast majority of Americans and American businesses are successful, then therefore a government largely made up of such people could be expected to be reasonably well-run. So those qualities are hardly the Mark of Doom."
So, I don't think that women are less capable than are men, I think that most people in gov't service, men or women, fall in the bottom 85% of capability.
In trying to find out more [...], I was amused to see this.
An ethnic doctor ?
Maybe the image changes.
I completely disagree with this statement...
In public life. In their private lives, they may disassociate with whomever they please.
The same thing that's wrong with a Cabinet of 15 men and 5 women, or even 20 men. You're the one who thinks there is a problem.
Then if there's no problem, let's put the twenty women in. There's no reason to object to that, based on what you've written.
...your rule will require gender discrimination.
So instead we should stick with the status quo, which is (ahem) gender discrimination ?
I don't quite get why you think that discriminating against women is fine, but discriminating against men is not.
Leaving to one side that you haven't given any reason to believe that there is any discrimination against women; this is about 2000 jobs in a nation of 300 million? And you want us to change the Constitution for that?
this is about 2000 jobs in a nation of 300 million?
No, it's about the best 2000 jobs in a nation of 146 million jobs.
In other words, it's about power, and leading the nation. We're not talking about slinging hash here.
And you want us to change the Constitution for that?
Unnecessary, although if we did it for blacks, why not for women ?
The U.S. Senate could just refuse to confirm more than ten men to the President's Cabinet.
At the state level, changing the State Constitutions is usually just a matter of a public vote or two, so that would be easy enough.
...you haven't given any reason to believe that there is any discrimination against women...
Women employed by the federal government at the Senior Executive Service, GS-15 or equivalent military rank; political appointees requiring confirmation; and elected officials: 1,500, or 22% of all such positions.
Source: Executive Women in Government
"We're not talking about slinging hash here."
Perhaps not, but I'm wondering if someone's been smoking hash here.
I really can't get my arms around oroborous' argument enough to even figure out how to argue against it.
But even if I were able to agree with it, I don't think there's a solution. People would figure out a way around the required legislation or amendment or whatever.
For example, these days, small corporations like my robot company don't really have a board of directors. They don't really have board meetings or shareholder meetings either. Oh sure, formally they do, but what we do for both those meetings, held once annually, is read a script crafted by our lawyers with the absolute minimum of information required by law. We're required 3 board members by law, but those are just the founders.
The reason for this, is that lots of directors of small companies have been sued in the past. Thus, I can't get anybody with any experience and wealth to sit directly on my board.
Instead, I have an advisory board made up of experienced business men in the community and my technology sector. This unofficial board gets compensated the way the regular board used to get compensated - with stock options and expenses. Since they just give non-binding advice and they are not on the board, they are one level more protected from getting sued. It really doesn't affect me all that much except that it makes things a bit more cumbersome.
Anyway, the point is that if a gender balance is somehow mandated, I predict those positions will quickly evolve toward figurehead positions and we won't be able to predict how ahead of time.
Thus, even if it's a good idea, the powers that be will adapt to get around it.
O: These are neither the best nor the most powerful jobs in the country. These are jobs like "US Alt Rep to the 60th Session of the UN General Assembly" or Commissioner on the Postal Regulatory Commission.
Also, I understand that you think that merely showing a discrepancy between the sex of nominees and the sex of the general population shows discrimination, but it doesn't in either law or logic.
Bret:
My position is simple:
Men hold the reins of power, and are reluctant to share with women.
Stop doing that.
David:
Please explain how having one gender holding 80% of the desired jobs is logically not supportive of discrimination.
If it could be shown that the jobs are unwanted by a given gender, then that would explain it - Skipper has been taking that tack.
But women want these jobs. They just aren't gettin' 'em.
I look forward to your illuminating reply.
I wonder if part of the issue here is a misunderstanding about the current state of affirmative action in employment. By and large, it is illegal for both government and private employers to base their hiring decisions on a persons race or sex. There are exceptions, but they are relatively rare.
That does not mean that private employers can't care about diversity or make a point of finding "diverse" job applicants, but they could not, for example, give women applicants a half point boost in their GPA when comparing them to men.
Oroborous:
Has even a single advocacy group (such as NOW, or something like that) complained about this?
David:
They aren't all dream jobs like "rock star", but they are jobs that are the culmination of careers, or that successful people in the private sector are recruited to take. These jobs also include those that require confirmation by the U.S. Senate; you must personally be extraordinarily successful if you believe that such jobs "are neither the best nor the most powerful jobs in the country".
(For instance, the writer Tom Clancy has publicly stated that members of Congress are "losers", because none of them get paid more than $ 200K/yr. (Although since he said that, the position of Speaker of the House has gotten a raise to $ 212K).
By and large, it is illegal for both government and private employers to base their hiring decisions on a persons race or sex.
Exactly.
Which is why the current situation is unacceptable.
The sex-discrimination suit against Wal~Mart is proceeding using pretty much the same evidence of wrong-doing that I've presented for the Fed. gov't:
"[U.S. District Court Judge Martin Jenkins] noted that in their case, 'plaintiffs present largely uncontested descriptive statistics which show that women working at Wal-Mart stores [...] take longer to enter management positions, and that the higher one looks in the organization the lower the percentage of women.'"
If current law allows the world’s largest private employer to be sued for maintaining a "glass ceiling", despite the facts that Wal~Mart's overall workforce is 2/3rds women, and that Wal~Mart employs more women than any other company in the nation, then I fail to see why the gov't can't be held to the same standard.
(Indeed, we are the poorer if gov't is not held to the HIGHEST standard, rather than allowed to meet a bar lower than that set for private citizens. As I have noted before, in the private sphere there are many choices and workarounds; there's only one gov't, so we're stuck with dealing with it.
Therefore, it should respond to us in the way that you've written that your local DMV does, to their credit).
In other words, Wal~Mart attempted to defend itself against the sex-discrimination suit with the same type of analysis that you got from the Bureau of Labor Statistics: "Hey, look at the gender breakdown of our workforce, if anything we're discriminating against men !"
But lesser-court judges, and most recently, on February 6, 2007, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, have ruled that giving women ample opportunity to perform scutwork, but very limited opportunity to be executives, is indeed gender discrimination.
Now, I understand that the Ninth Court is reliably liberal, and that this might not be the last word on whether the case may proceed, much less on how it'll be decided.
But it appears that my position is well within the boundries of mainstream legal thinking.
If it could be shown that the jobs are unwanted by a given gender, then that would explain it - Skipper has been taking that tack.
Unfortunately, given my 20 years of government service, there is apparently an 85% chance I am doing so incompetently.
O: Did you even read the website you linked to. According to the EWG website, 28% of the Senior Executive Service was female. 35% of the next grouping, which feeds into the SES, was female. In 1992, only 11% of the SES were women. (By the way, I note that EWG is mostly about career civil service jobs, not the jobs you were focusing on way back two comments ago.)
Also, this is what EWG has to say about the civilian labor force: Not all federal occupations are directly comparable to the occupations categorized in the CLF. However, in 2005 about 51 percent of the relatively higher paying jobs in the CLF, i.e., jobs in management, professional, and related occupations, were held by women. In other words, women are not being excluded from the higher paying managerial jobs in private industry.
Now, let's look at some non-discriminatory reasons for the imbalance of men and women in the SES. Most importantly, the civil service is all about careers and seniority. The people coming into the SES today are those who entered government service 15 or 20 years ago. What we are seeing today is the fruits of women entering the federal workforce in the past, and we will continue to see the number of women grow.
Also, as you say, there are also jobs where we would expect women to self-select away from. For example, EWG counts the military as part of the federal workforce. I assume that no one is going to be surprised to learn that women are underrepresented in the military compared to the civilian labor force.
I did some quick noodling around at DoD, and see that women are woefully underrepresented at the top ranks of the military. Only 5.6% of flag officers are women. Only about 12% of Colonels and LTCs (or the naval equivalent) are women. Even at the lower levels of the officer corps, only 18% of 2d Lts are women. Only about 14% of the enlisted ranks are women. (All numbers are as of September 2006.) Of course, the military is one of the few government or private employers that is forbidden to hire women for certain jobs. I'm sincerely curious: given that here we have actual discrimination, do you want to force the military to hire women until it's workforce is 51% female?
Bret:
Yes and yes and yes.
Here is an article that shows how having greater feminine representation in gov't will benefit the nation, and our society:
"In January of 2006 Ebonya Washington of Yale University released a paper that correlates how male legislators vote on women’s issues to how many daughters they have. While it’s been shown before that US fathers are much more likely to support pay equity, comparable worth and Title IX policies if they parent only daughters, a study of how male legislators vote based on the gender of their children has not been done before.
"Washington takes the congressional voting record of the 105th congress (1997-1998) and the scores given by National Organization of Women (NOW) for those voting records (0 to 100) and screens them through the male legislators who have one to three children and the number of those children that are female. The key findings from this fascinating report on male legislators are:
Those with all female children have NOW scores 13 points higher than those with all male children.
Among representatives with two children, those with one daughter showed an increase in NOW scores of 9 points.
"Those with two daughters showed a total increase of 27 points over those with no daughters – almost a 100% increase..."
Source.
In other words, being responsible for raising females alters the way that males think about the world, and how they vote. So clearly, male-heavy administrations don't represent society as well as would administrations with gender parity, or else there would have been no statistically-significant differences between voting patterns.
O: I really don't want to turn this into a seminar on the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, fascinating though they are. The Ninth Circuit's decision is here. Anyone sufficiently masochistic is welcome to read it.
Quickly, it just doesn't say what you say it says. First, it isn't about the merits, it's about whether class certification was appropriate. In this circumstance, the purpose of the statistics was to show that the plaintiffs could at least show the jury that women employees are treated similarly by WalMart nationally; that is, that there are common questions of fact that apply to the class. Second, the statistics there are much more sophisticated than simply looking at the number of women WalMart employs or promotes and comparing it to the workforce in general. Third, and here's where the court agrees with me, no one -- not the plaintiffs and not the court -- suggests that statistical differences, alone, are sufficient to prove discrimination.
(Also, I suspect that you're ignoring the difference between claims of discriminatory animus, which can't be proved by statistics alone, and disparate impact, which sometimes can if the plaintiff identifies a policy that is facially neutral but is discriminatory in practice.)
I see we've reached the googling for straws portion of this Internet debate.
In 1992, only 11% of the SES were women.
Yes, it's gotten better: After a generation, women in gov't executive positions are only outnumbered 2 - 1 by men, rather than 9 - 1. So the trend is good.
But I don't think that we should have to wait until 2050 for gender parity, if in fact the trend continues.
28% of the Senior Executive Service was female. 35% of the next grouping, which feeds into the SES, was female.
This strikes you as supporting a claim that no discrimination exists ?
By the way, I note that EWG is mostly about career civil service jobs, not the jobs you were focusing on way back two comments ago.
They also include the jobs that I'm focused upon, as well as elective offices, which I don't think should be subject to quotas.
Is it a perfect source? No. Mea culpa.
But I didn't write a fully-formed and researched opinion on the subject before the thought came to me when reading the French election coverage, and I don't have the time to develop the idea properly.
[D]o you want to force the military to hire women until it's workforce is 51% female?
No, because associating with the military is voluntary, and all qualified women who want to join are allowed to so do.
But associating with gov't at all levels is not voluntary, in fact it's virtually inescapable.
And I am interested in reading your argument about how the figures I'm seeing for appointed and patronage positions don't logically support a claim of discrimination. Maybe I'm wrong.
But again, if having one gender hold 60% - 80% of the jobs isn't discriminatory, then there should be absolutely no problem in giving women 70% of such jobs, yes ?
Nobody has addressed that simple point.
Unfortunately, given my 20 years of government service, there is apparently an 85% chance I am doing so incompetently.
LOL.
Hey, I put in eight years myself, and in the private sector, I've proven to be 100% incompetent. So 85% would be a step up, for me.
[I]t just doesn't say what you say it says.
No doubt I wrote sloppily in that post.
What I mean is, Judge Martin Jenkins ruled that giving women ample opportunity to perform scutwork, but very limited opportunity to be executives, is indeed gender discrimination, and the Ninth Circuit Court did not overturn his ruling.
My argument is essentially that there is "disparate impact" in Federal appointments, and I am willing to accept a quota system to end that.
Are we in agreement that there is discrimination, and disagreement over remedies, or do you not think that a problem exists ?
Oroborous:
I couldn't find where on those sites you linked to (the "Yes and yes and yes" sites) proposed any sort of quota legislation (or amendment). It seemed to me in my quick scan of those sites that their purpose is to support, through existing channels, women getting into government.
Did I miss something (important)?
O: I have no problem with women being 70% of the SES as long as they are qualified for those jobs. I absolutely reject "giving" anyone any job because she's a woman.
You say on the one hand that you have no problem with the fact that the military is heavily weighted towards men as a matter of law but that much less disproportionality in the civil service must be the result of discrimination and must be remedied by giving women jobs for which they are not the most qualified candidate. (To reiterate, if a woman is the most qualified candidate, I want her to have the job regardless of what the job is or how many other women the government employs.)
You fundamentally misunderstand the decision in the WalMart case which was emphatically not deciding that WalMart had discriminated and emphatically not deciding that statistics alone could prove discrimination.
We might have a more fundamental disagreement than I thought. What does "discrimination" mean to you?
Oroborous:
Thinking about this more, I find it difficult to advocate for a majority group (there are substantially more women voters than men voters - by millions). If this issue were adequately important to women, they could simply vote themselves into all offices and appoint themselves to every post and run 100% of government.
I find that often, when people try to advocate for downtrodden groups (for example, the poor), the result often ends up turning out even worse for the (in this case, supposedly) downtrodden group.
Women have the power, they can do whatever they like (especially with your vote). If they're not so interested, neither am I.
—Then if there's no problem, let's put the twenty women in. There's no reason to object to that, based on what you've written.—
I don't object to such a Cabinet. I object to having a law requiring such a Cabinet. You're also making the mistake you made earlier - it's not "us" who put the men or women in the Cabinet, but the President. Complain to him, not us.
—So instead we should stick with the status quo, which is (ahem) gender discrimination ?—
No, which tolerates gender discrimination. Far better to tolerate than require.
—I don't quite get why you think that discriminating against women is fine, but discriminating against men is not.—
Most likely because that's not at all what I think or have argued. I have at all times in this discussion objected to legally requiring gender discrimination. My personal rule is that if a law mentions a set of people by non-relevant properties, it's a bad law.
Hey, if you want to put quotas on top level government positions, why not one limiting the number of lawyers? That, I could support.
One of the great lines about the early Clinton administration was that he promised us a cabinet that looked like America but gave us a cabinet that looked like Harvard Law School.
I know! Let's pass an amendment that requires politicians to keep their promises! That'd solve everything!
Thank you all for the food for thought - I regret that I cannot continue the conversation, due to a severe time crunch.
If this issue were adequately important to women, they could simply vote themselves into all offices and appoint themselves to every post and run 100% of government.
Truth.
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