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Career News: The Racial Wage Gap and My Paysa.com Interview

Racial Wage Gap research

The racial wage gap needs more attention and focus because it affects millions of people. I explained before I am looking for more studies on the racial wage gap. To help close the racial wage gap, job seekers who are affected must negotiate more than they do. But, there needs to be an understanding of how it happened. The paying fields need to be leveled. More research needs to be public.

Maybe companies need to be PG (pay gap) certified, or IA (Inclusion Approved) to be considered for tax breaks. Yeah, we can argue the potential problems with labeling companies but it’s time to crack down on companies who are not fairly compensating individuals for their abilities.

The Economic Policy Institute recently released their research of the racial pay gap and its effect on the African-American community at large. Here are a few of it’s findings:

Black men’s average hourly wages were 22 percent less than those of white men in comparable jobs; in 1979, the wage gap was 16.9 percent.
Black women’s average hourly wages were 11.7 percent less than those of white women; in 1979, the gap was 4.5 percent.
In 1979, black women’s wages were 42.3 percent lower than those of white men and 25.4 percent lower than those of black men. By 2015, these differences had narrowed, but remain significant—34.2 percent and 12.2 percent lower than white and black men, respectively.

If you would like to look at the entire study published in it’s entirety, go here to the website.

Paysa.com interview

Paysa was founded in 2015, and just started publishing data in February 2016. According to it’s site, Paysa is, “…your always on, AI-driven career coach enabling you to build an amazing career & get paid the market salary you deserve…”

People from Paysa.com asked me questions to include their feature on their site. They asked me about the current climate for job seekers, salary negotiation, and reasons for my writing and publishing about the gender wage gap.

Paysa features other career professionals as part of their “Expert Interview Series.” My feature was just published a couple of days ago. Go check it out and let me know what you think.

If you haven’t subscribed to the podcast, please do. We have informative shows coming up that should help your job search in a big way!

About Mark Anthony Dyson

I am the "The Voice of Job Seekers!" I offer compassionate career and job search advice as I hack and re-imagine the job search process. You need to be "the prescription to an employer's job description." You must be solution-oriented and work in positions in companies where you are the remedy. Your job search must be a lifestyle, and your career must be in front of you constantly. You can no longer shed your aspirations at the change seasons. There are strengths you have that need constant use and development. Be sure you sign up to download my E-Book, "421 Modern Job Search Tips 2021!" You can find my career advice and work in media outlets such as Forbes, Inc., Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, Glassdoor, and many other outlets.

by Mark Anthony Dyson

Someone told me not to take a job that won’t pay me what I’m worth

Someone recently asked me a salary negotiation question. I am not always crazy about the “pay me what I’m worth” statements. She wanted to know what I thought about what she was told by her best friend, “Don’t take a job that won’t pay me what I’m worth?” She said, “I am asking because I hear it often. I have been out of work six months and I’m ready to take the first offer. How do you feel about this advice?”

I responded:

It depends on the job seekers circumstance. There is not a one answer fitting all circumstances. In general, it’s terrible general advice because many people are not driven by money. Many people are energized by a career that’s lined up with his or her personal values. It is more important the impact of what they do is personally rewarding than being well paid.

At the same time, you should have a deep understanding of your value. You may not see it now, but in years to come without negotiating your salary is careless. You should always negotiate your salary and understand your market value. Always. Otherwise, the money you neglect to ask for will be lost in just a few years.

Mind shift

In fact, you must shift you mind. It is not only a salary negotiation, it’s a compensation package negotiation. You must consider the whole package than just being paid your worth. It’s right in principle, and wrong in focus. You’re worth is cash.

Areas to negotiate:

Salary

Salary increases

Days per week/month in the office

Time off

Perks

Educational Opportunities

Flex schedules and more!

Then again…

Not to take a job solely due to the lack of money for those who either in control of their career trajectory or they don’t understand the breadth of his or her profession. If you know the rigor of your profession requires mental or physical preparation or recovery, then you need to consider the compensation package accordingly.

People think its good advice because of their own values and feelings about money. It’s not good for anyone who cares about a career meaning more than money. Having meaning and money is ideal, but not always realistic. Many times you can only have one or the other. Whenever you get advice, you must translate it appropriately to your values and expectations.

I just worked with a nurse whose passion is traveling to third world countries as part of a group to help with its medical and spiritual needs. Although she works for a large hospital in a ideal situation, she is planning to do this full-time in the near future. She doesn’t care about the income, but looks forward to immersing herself into helping the poverty-stricken. She knows what the market value is for some of the work she’ll do and understands the range, but she looks for the value in the experience.

About Mark Anthony Dyson

by Mark Anthony Dyson

A Negotiating Strategy for Women Only

The follow article is reprinted from the Ivy Exec blog with their permission as part of our content exchange.

Women don’t negotiate as much as men do.

Study after study shows women are less likely to push for a better salary offer. The common explanations: women lack confidence and women are socialized not to speak up. Those may be part of the problem, but there is more to it.

What if the reason is that women are correctly assessing that asking for more might actually harm them?

Women who negotiate often suffer negative consequences, a phenomenon that researchers call “social cost.” In studies in which people rated their impressions of employees who negotiate and those who don’t, and then determine who they would most wanted to work with, researchers found that people were less inclined to work with someone who has negotiated. The effect was greater for women than men, sometimes significantly so.

According to the paper, “Male evaluators penalized female candidates more than male candidates for initiating negotiations; female evaluators penalized all candidates for initiating negotiations. Perceptions of niceness and demandingness explained resistance to female negotiators.”

Interestingly, women who were negotiating for other people were evaluated more favorably than those who are advocating for themselves.

A Negotiating Strategy for Women Only

So what is the solution? One of the researchers, Hannah Riley Bowles of Harvard’s Kennedy School, advises in HBR.org that women use a “relational account” —that is, an “I and We”strategy. The idea is to approach negotiations by asking for what you want while also showing the person on the other side of the table that you are also taking their perspective. Beyond the classic win-win, the strategy is not just about both sides winning, but winning together.

The key is explaining to your negotiating counterpart why — from his point-of-view — it’s legitimate for you to be negotiating. Sheryl Sandburg, for example, has written that in her negotiations with Facebook, she legitimized her stance by reminding them that being a good negotiator would be necessary to succeeding in the role they wanted her to fill. “Show you care about your relationship,” writes Bowles. Prepare for your negotiations by scripting the conversation to highlight the importance of your relationship—how much you value it—with the person across the table.

When a woman’s reasons for negotiating were perceived as legitimate, the strategy worked to lessen negative repercussions. The same was true when she communicated concern fororganizational relationships. Using that formula “helped women both get what they wanted andmake the impression that they wanted to make,” writes Bowles.

Interestingly, negotiating using an outside job offer was not as successful; perhaps because it defeated the “we” aspect of the strategy that emphasizes an ongoing relationship. It’s hard to convince someone to give you a raise when you have one foot out the door.

About the Author

Susan Price has been writing about careers, entrepreneurs and personal finance for more than a decade. She’s been an editor at BusinessWeek, Money, and iVillage.com, among others.