April 1, 2014



Do We Care About The Ways Life Kicks You In The Ass? Not If You're A Man

A lot of journal articles are a slog to get through. This one isn't, and it's worth the read. It's Wayne State law professor Kingsley R. Browne's paper on how only certain sex disparities -- those negatively affecting women -- become the subject of widespread concern, and something seen to be in need of correction. A bit from the abstract:

Ones that are perceived as favoring men are labeled "gaps," while those that favor women are simply facts. Outside the workplace, men are arguably disadvantaged in a variety of arenas, whether in terms of health and longevity, crime and violence, domestic relations, or education. In the workplace, men are far more likely than women to be killed and to work long hours. None of these disparities is generally viewed as a "gap" deserving of intervention, however. Men earn a disproportionate number of Ph.Ds in some fields, while women earn a disproportionate number in others. Only the former set of disparities, however, is typically viewed as a "gap." Many of the statistical disparities between the sexes in the workplace are a consequence of average sex differences in the choices that men and women make about education, the workplace, and the family. Many of these choices are products, in part, of biologically influenced sex differences in talents, temperament, and tastes (all of which appear to be influenced by testosterone), and they all involve trade-offs.

Download it here, free. (Saving the $20 you'd pay on Lexis-Nexis.) You'll be glad you did. Promise!

An excerpt from the paper:

Although it is true that there are more spectacular male successes there are also more spectacular failures, though they get far less attention. Similarly, the tendency of men more than women to devote themselves single-mindedly to their careers is certainly related to some of the workplace gaps, but it is also the reason why women more often end up with custody of the children upon divorce when status as primary caretaker is given weight in custody decisions. That same devotion to the job can also lead to premature death from overwork. Moreover, many of the traits that may pay off in the workplace are the same traits that can lead to violent crime and early death. The fact is that the workplace requires tradeoffs, and those tradeoffs are likely to be weighed differently by different people, according to their own preferences and motivations. What leads one person to choose a career in finance and another person to choose a career in elementary education? Or one person to be a high-rise iron worker and another a dental hygienist? Or one person to intensify workforce commitment after becoming a parent and another person to reduce it? Individual differences in talents no doubt play a large role, as do well-established sex differences in social preferences, risk preferences, and competitive preferences. Which is the "better" choice? It depends upon the abilities and preferences of the individuals, but more men will choose careers in finance and as iron-workers, and more women will choose to be dental hygienists and elementary-school teachers. Despite the frequent assertion that the gaps that favor men (although not those that favor women) are results of invidious social forces, the truth seems to be somewhat more basic. If the various workplace and non-workplace gaps could be distilled down to a single word, that word would not be "discrimination" but "testosterone." Testosterone is associated with a variety of sex-typed behaviors and traits (even in females), including dominance seeking, aggression, risk preferences, fear, spatial ability, occupational preferences, entrepreneurship, nurturance, and empathy, and it may also be causally related to differences in life expectancy. These traits are all related in one way or another to most of the gaps that have been discussed. The failure to acknowledge tradeoffs has resulted in a somewhat distorted perspective on the part of some advocates for women. They seem to want all of the benefits of being a man with none of the costs. The question should not be "do you want the good stuff or the bad stuff?"; it should instead be "do you want the high-testosterone package or the low-testosterone package, each of which comes with some good and some bad?"

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