What do you think?

[NickE]

I guess this is something that has been eating me for quite a while. At my first job out of college the plant foreman mad a comment to me along the lines of: "Why do you need more money? You're single and have no kids."

I've also had similar statements made to me at other positions and in my current one.

My question is: Do married/family people recieve a greater amount of compensation on average than singles?

Also why is discrimination like this (if it exists) allowed to continue?

Or is being single and without dependants really such a small minority of people that we have no power? Or are we considered such an aberation that we dont deserve equivalent compensation?

I know I never take a sick day cause of my kids/family/wife/pregnancy etc... I can work weekends/nights with little thought for anyone cept the people I may have committed to, and myself. My healthcare definately is much cheaper than a family of 4.

Either way I just dont really understand why it makes a difference whether I have a family or not: "I do the job, I should get the pay."

 

[haggis]

NickE

I'm laughing at your post but don't take offence if you are serious because I can't make up my mind if you are kidding or not. Especially the bit about being such an aberation. If you are serious, damn right you should get the same pay.

 

[SB63]

Prove him wrong and take another job that pays more when the opportunity arises. I have been in your shoes before.

 

[nad3ooo]

HAH!

nickE:

maybe if you werent so eager to work nights and weekends, you might be able to get out from your cubicle and scare up a good lookin woman to marry!

hah!

then you could have a payraise and some time off...

-see also: thread about blame culture

nadz

 

[SWComposites]

What type of job do you have? What type of company? I have seen cases where single people were actually paid better, because they are more likely to quit for a better job at a different company or location. There must be some other reason why you are not getting the same salary as your peers. You probably should look for another job and be sure to get an appropriate starting salary.

 

[Beggar]

Do married/family people recieve a greater amount of compensation on average than singles?

Probably. Of course, married folks probably tend to be further along in their careers and therefore are being paid commensurate with their experience level.

Also why is discrimination like this (if it exists) allowed to continue?

It's not discrimination. Each person negotiates their salary based on their mutually agreed upon value to the company. On the front end, the company doesn't even know *if* you're married (unless they violate Federal law).

Or is being single and without dependants really such a small minority of people that we have no power?

Unless you're part of a collective bargaining group, you're being addressed as an individual.

"I do the job, I should get the pay."

By definition, you get paid what you and your employer collectively agree you are worth. I doubt that your marital status has anything to do with it.


--------------------
Bring back the HP-15

http://www.hp15c.org

--------------------

 

[NickE]

Haggis- I'm partially kidding, but seriously people in HR (at various companies) have said this kind of stuff to me.

nad3ooo- Yeah you might be right, however I really have no intention of marrying nor of having children. My nieces, nephews, cousins, and etc.. will be enough. Also I'm not blaming, so much as taking a survey to see if this theroy has occured to others and what their opinion is. (IE am I completely off base here? Probably huh, then what about the things that have been said to me?)

SWComposites- It's not my peers internally, it in relation to industry wide compensation surveys. And you're definately right about starting salery.

Beggar- Equal education/experience, quality of work, etc.

You acutally, in your first statement, show the bias I am trying to describe. Why would a married person necessarily be further along in their career, or have more experience, or be a better worker? I personally am familar with people who have gotten married as soon as they finished their BS degrees.

This is not a starting salery issue. I'm sure that the reduction of raises due to family status and no other reason is discrimination. As much as if it were due to race/creed/color/sex/sexual orientation/etc...

What I mean by saying that we have no power is; Is marrage so predominant in our society that those of us who for whatever reason decide not to marry are at a disadvantage? (And I dont mean w/ healthcare, survivor benefits, or the tax return, or whatever other advantages there are to getting married)

And of course my pay is an aggreement between me and my employer because I am an At Will Employee.

nick
Ehhh... its friday at 4:45 and there is still work to be done.

(Oh Im not trying to change the world, just looking for some input. Maybe I should have posted this one in the Pub)















OK, now to clarify. First this was just an idle question cause of various responses that I've gotten from others.

I'm really only looking for across the average ideas. IE: Two engineers, same education and continuing education, same level of experience, same age, etc... IE: the difference is that one is married w/ two young children, the other is single and has no intention of gettin hitched. Do you think that the "family man" will get larger rasies over (oh lets say) 3 years of his career?

(I know every situation is different, but as a general trend do you think that persons who get the "Well John over here just had another kid he needs more money now, while Jack will just spend anything we give him on toys.")

 

[metengr]

NickE;
You need to filter out the typical corporate bull#$&%, and not worry what other people say regarding your employment status or pay.

I am sure we have all been exposed to "talkers" in various positions that attempt to get a rise or reaction out of individuals. When I first started out as an Engineer, it sort of bothered me. But as you get older, you realize these people are just feeding you garbage. Just laugh it off, walk away and continue to focus on your job performance.

Talk is cheap. Every company has politicians and favorites.

 

[IRstuff]

Actually, married people need more money because most of them are two income families and the tax laws treat the income as essentially coming from a single person, so we pay more taxes than two single people.



Other than that, studies have shown that married people are happier and live longer, so they'll generally be more productive and have longer careers, hence will have larger lifetime earnings.

TTFN

 

[casseopeia]

Discrimination based on marital status IS against the law. If you think that is happening, and the company has more than 15-20 employees (sorry, can't remember the current Federal minimum), you can complain to the EEOC. Local and State labor laws may also prohibit such discrimination. The employee minimum is generally lower than the Federal one.

Making assumptions regarding your financial obligations based on a lack of a spouse and children is, at best, rude and arrogant. Who is to say that you didn't opt to support your aging parents instead of getting married and having chidren, and what difference would that make in any case.

I wouldn't stew too much over a plant foreman. Sounds like that one has little management training and even fewer social skills.

I'll bet few company owners, or persons in charge of salary determination, would pay someone more just because they had a high personal cost of living. Think about it. If you went to a supervisor and said, "gee, my wife just had quintuplets and I can barely make the boat payments now," do you think you would get an automatic raise? I don't think so.

If you think you are not being compensated fairly, get your stuff together and go and ask for a raise. Financial and marital status should NEVER enter the discussion.

 

[ctopher]

Pay rate does not vary between married and single employees. Sometimes it may seem like it, but I don't think it is the case. I do believe it is based a lot on favoritism and sometimes on your performance, depending on the field you work and atmosphere.
IMO, the boss that says "Why do you need more money? You're single and have more kids", is probably jealous of the employee's single life, unhappy with his marriage or himself, is a wanna-be-manager, or all of the above.
This type of bias varies in the work place.
Pay discrimination varies between lifestyle (marriage/single/sex), how you get along with others, do you golf with "the team", going to lunch and doing something special that makes the boss look good ... and others.
Just my .02


Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP2.0 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site

FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716

 

[ivymike]

Actually, married people need more money because most of them are two income families and the tax laws treat the income as essentially coming from a single person, so we pay more taxes than two single people

That's not the way it worked out when I got married - I got the largest tax return I'd had in years. As a couple we had more deductions available (because the caps on certain types of deductions were higher), and it ended up being worth a couple of grand at the end of the year.

 

[IRstuff]

That's usually only if your spouse's income is substantially lower than yours or vice-versa. Even then, the incremental tax rate on your spouse's income is higher than if that income was reported as a single income.

If your spouse's income is comparable to yours, then the incremental tax rate is significantly higher than that of a single taxpayer.

Obviously, your mileage may vary, but I was already itemizing deductions prior to marriage and the extra income came with more taxes than deductions.

TTFN

 

[EddyC]

NickE,

Low ball employers always try to find some way to justify paying an employee less. Your foreman doesn't care whether you are single or not, he/she just wants to find an excuse to pay you less than you'd like. Some folks are also just jealous of the freedom of single people.

 

[ivymike]

I suppose I should start acting like I'm terribly overtaxed too, and try to shift as much of the burden as possible to people other than myself. Now that I'm married and considered "wealthy" by the IRS, I should probably be thinking about cutting taxes for the top 2% and pissing on the rest... it would, after all, be in my best interest (at least in the short term).

Back to the original question, though, I think that there is some amount of "lifestyle discrimination" that goes on in every company. At some point, management has to decide who gets a raise and who doesn't, and it's often a judgement call by a particular manager. The personal relationships between employees and nearby management will always have some effect on the outcome of that decision (at some companies more than others). Affiliation and mimicry are great ways to improve your social standing. If your boss knows you personally and comes over to the occasional barbeque, that can be helpful or harmful, depending on his judgments about your personal life. The more similar your life is to his, the more likely he'll view you favorably at appraisal time. Pick the right political views, talk about the right religion, make sure your wife wears the right clothes, teach your kids the proper sports, it all helps... If you happen to be a waitress, one of the best things you can do for your tips is to immitate the mannerisms of your customers as well as you can, and recite their orders as closely as possible to the way they placed them. Whoever you are, don't be caught with a bumper sticker on your car advocating the candidate of a political party other than that of your boss - he can fire you for that.


More on mimicry:

http://www.psych.yorku.ca/kawakami/documents/mimicry_000.pdf

fired for bumper sticker / other political views:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1214148/posts

http://www.detnews.com/2003/entertainment/0305/30/c01-178421.htm

http://www.themilitant.com/2002/6604/660402.html

 

[zdas04]

I've never seen marital status be factored into a salary decision.

I've frequently seen it factored into a job assignment decision. Many managers see a project that requires a lot of extra time and travel as an ideal place to put an unmarried worker. These jobs often lead to high visibility and rapid advancement. I've heard married workers complain many times that the unspoken requirement for a particular assignment was to be unmarried. Companies can't post "this assignment will only go to (un)married applicants" without invoking several laws, but they can implictly give precedence to individuals with a particular maritial status.

I remember one project that required a daily conference call at 15:00 local time. One applicant had to pick up his kids at 15:30 every day and was angry that he didn't get the assignment, so I guess it goes both ways.

The guy that said "why do you need money?" was just an idiot.

David

 

[kchayfie]

I volunteered for a project that (I understood) required 2 or 3 days a week in the client's offices 200 miles from the company office. When I started, I found that the client expected me to be based in their office 5 days a week and the attitude from the management in my company is "you're young, free and single so there's no reason why you can't move down there?" Never mind that I chose the job with that company because it was only 10 miles from my home and my parents/grandparents/siblings/social life/hobbies/etc/etc.

 

[corus]

Although the point is valid, that a single person should not be discrimitaed against, the question to be asked is why did you ask for more money?
It is sometimes annoying to hear young graduates demanding more money after working for a few months or large starting salaries when their knowledge and experience is limited. This causes resentment from older workers who see little pay differential after 30 years service compared to graduates with 30 months. My guess is that in the foreman's mind he was saying 'I'm the one who needs more money, I'm married to a shopaholic!, but it came out opposite.

corus

 

[davidinindy]

I'm sure there are a lot of unseen discriminations happening. For example, a single guy pulls up to work in a nice new Vette goes out and blows money at the bars on thew weekends, has an expensive health club membership... Boss doesn't see him needing more money. Thinks "He's living pretty comfortably.
Married guy with two kids might drive a five year old minivan or SUV, spend money on new computer for kids, soccer uniforms, band instruments, etc... not to mention kids college fund.
Sympethetic boss may think this guys having it rough... Maybe I'll give him a raise.
It's not fair, but I'm sure it happens.

David

 

[ctopher]

Discrimination, racism, bigotry, sexism, favoritism, and the others. They are all in our lives everywhere, just some people don't see it and/or don't want to see it. A lot do it, and hide it well. Everyone just needs to educate themselves on how to recognize it and live thru it. It has always been here in some form, and always will be.

Chris
Sr. Mechanical Designer, CAD
SolidWorks 05 SP2.0 / PDMWorks 05
ctopher's home site

FAQ559-1100
FAQ559-716