High Salaries For Women In Health Occupations example essay topic

In the 21st Century the number of women enrolling in higher education institutions is surpassing the numbers of men enrolled. The graduation rates of women from high school and higher education are most often higher than for men. The number of women graduates from most professional occupations, including higher paying medicine, law and business, will exceed the number of men graduates in the near future. In numerous occupational areas with a majority of women graduates, salaries already surpass salaries in occupational areas with a majority of men graduates. Gender wage gaps in 2004 are not primarily caused by discrimination against women. Gender wage gaps are largely the result of work history, experience, industry and the choices women make.

Examples would be three of my four very successfully employed Master's degree daughters in their 30's who are now temporarily staying at home taking care of their young children. An example of the significant advances made by women in employment and wages is the annual follow-up of the graduates of the Wisconsin Technical College System. Universities and university systems like the University of Wisconsin System do not have comparable data for their graduates. University research on employment is largely hype about the importance of four-year graduates with no analysis of comprehensive hard data. Women graduates from the 16 Wisconsin Technical College Districts in 2003 made up 12,589 (65%) of 19,358 graduates as compared to 6,745 (35%) men. The percentage of women graduates from the WTCS has increased significantly since the 1980's but has been more than 50% for at least the last 20 years.

The percentage of women graduates nationally from American two and four colleges and universities is increasing significantly each year and will eventually exceed or be on a par with men graduates from higher education nationally in "most" academic and professional majors, if they do not already exceed men in 2004. Unbelievably, women and the media have reiterated the phony claim that discrimination is "the" reason that women on average make less money than men in "selected" occupations forever. But the most flagrant misinformation about gender and jobs is (1) That in order to achieve wage equity with men it is claimed that affirmative action is necessary to employ more women in higher paying occupations in which men are the majority and (2) That occupations in which women are the majority are largely low paying occupations. As shown by the graduates of the WTCS System, nothing could be further from the truth! It has been claimed since the 1960's, and still is in the 2000's, that Technical education programs are the major job areas of growth in the so-called high-tech and high pay jobs of the future. The truth is that health occupations is the leader of job growth and the higher paying jobs of the future.

In the WTCS System 50% (9,681 of 19,358 graduates) were in health occupations and 84.5% of health occupations graduates were women. Comparison of numbers of graduates and median annual salaries of some WTCS Associate Degree programs with above average salaries is as follows 1. Highest Median Salary Dental Hygienists $45,756 (174 Graduates) Dental Hygienists have had the highest median salary for at least 4 years 2. Associate Degree Nurses $40,735 (872 Graduates) 3. Associate Degree Health Occupations $39,455 (1,494 Graduates from 18 programs) 4. Associate Degree Technical programs $31,660 (892 Graduates from 42 programs) 5.

Associate Degree Service Occupations $30,000 (805 Graduates from 12 programs) (Includes Fire and Criminal Justice) (See web 202-The 2003 Output of the Wisconsin Technical College System for analysis of WTCS programs) Affirmative action programs for women identify occupations for recruitment of women based primarily on a belief that any job with a high percentage of men as compared to women is higher paid than jobs with higher percentages of women. In addition it is believed that the primary reason that women are not employed in these jobs is gender bias. Unreasonably, it is then said that women for any job such as, heavy construction, heavy manufacturing, engineering, technical and industrial jobs and police and fire, that have a majority of men should achieve parity with men for no rational reason. Men and women differ in physical characteristics and abilities, temperament and in academic aptitude that most often determines the type of job an individual is capable of doing well and interested in being employed. While there are wide differences in men and women and overlap in abilities: Most men are stronger than women and women tend to attain higher academic achievement than men in most academic areas.

In the case of academic achievement the differences may be because of temperament rather than intelligence. One of the few professional occupations that have a large majority of men that women will not achieve parity very soon is engineering. Math and spatial relationships are two of very few academic areas that men have on average higher academic achievement than women. However it is not sufficient for women to be the majority in all professional occupations except engineering. It is claimed that teacher bias against girls is the reason that girls on average are not as successful in math as boys. Many women do work in low wage occupations such as childcare and nursing assistant because that is where jobs are available.

Nursing Assistant graduates of 5,585 represent 29% of the 19,358 total WTCS graduates in 2003. The great increases in Nursing Assistant graduates are due to the following. 1) A Nursing Assistant certificate is now required for entrance into the LPN Nursing program and other Health occupations and is now a requirement for AD Nursing. 2) Nursing Assistant graduates employed by nursing homes and other health employers who took course work at WTCS campuses were not counted as WTCS graduates in the past by some WTCS Districts Graduates of Nursing Assistant and Child Care programs are readily employed and are certified for employment in their fields.

In comparison there are only 1,945 Industrial graduates from 69 Short term and 1 yr and 2 yr diploma programs. Nursing Assistant graduates of 5,585 total more than six times the total of 849 graduates from 41 Technical Division programs in 2003. Nursing Assistant graduates of 4,641 total more than five times the total of 831 graduates from the 41 Technical Division programs in 2002. There are very few jobs available in Technical and Industrial areas for the many more than 5,000 women graduating from nursing assistant and child care programs.

Comparison of numbers of graduates and annual median salaries from Heath occupations and Child Care to some Industrial programs graduates are as follows. Short-Term Nursing Assistant $20,009 (5,585 graduates) 1 Year Practical Nursing $29,139 (358 graduates) 1 Year Medical Assistant $22,499 (254 graduates) Associate Degree Child Care & Dev. $20,746 (203 graduates) 1 Year Wood Technics $23,998 (122 graduates) 2 Year Automotive Tech. $21,433 (96 graduates) 1 Year Auto Maintenance Tech. $21,880 (95 graduates) 1 Year Auto Body Paint $20,278 (89 graduates) Associate Degree Auto Tech $24,950 (65 graduates) 1 Year Electricity $21,963 (60 graduates) 1 Year Printing $20,799 (32 graduates) Associate Degree Printing & Publishing $21,839 (32 graduates) Child Care and Nursing Assistant starting salaries are low and below the median of 2003 graduate salary of $26,403. However many Industrial Division programs are also well below the median and well below the high salaries for women in Health Occupations, Business and Marketing.

Dental Hygiene ($45,756 in 2003) has had the highest entry-level salary for years. The following misleading statement is often made, "Women must be recruited into the many higher paying technical jobs in order to earn a living wage". The AD Nursing ($40,735 in 2003 and 872 graduates) and CIS Programmer Analyst ($35,364 in 2003 and 357 graduates) programs have a majority of women graduates. Minority men and all men might be recruited into occupations dominated by women for money reasons. Because many Health Occupations require certification or licensing prior to obtaining employment, most health graduates are not employed in their field prior to graduation. The high paying jobs in the Service, T & I and Business Divisions are often those in which graduates have prior experience or are employed in the field prior to graduation.

Programs such as Fire Science, Basic Police Recruit, Supervisory Management, and Materials Management would be examples. Other examples would be a number of Technical and Industrial programs with less than 25 graduates.