Beatrix Campbell via Tim Worstall:
… There is a new global settlement: neoliberal neopatriarchy. This is an ugly term for an ugly relationship. Neoliberalisation is the subordination of the social state to the market, and neopatriarchy tolerates girls being astronauts or bankers, but resists genuine reform of the sexual division of labour.
Campbell notes an interesting fact:
Neoliberal neopatriarchy is shaping the world. Before China embraced capitalism in 1979, workers were poor, but pretty much equally so. In 1988, women earned 87% of men's pay – now they're down to 67%.
Let me make sure I get this right. When women have less freedom to choose their jobs, earnings were equal,* but when there is a policy shift that allows women more freedom to choose their jobs their relative earnings fall.
Folks … this is prima facie evidence that the gender gap in earnings is caused by women’s choices and not by social restrictions.
As a matter of fact, if you could get the data, this is a journal quality example of how to use external data to solve an observational equivalence problem in a non-experimental setting (initially noted by Nobel Prize winner Tom Sargent and addressed by many since then).
Going back to Campbell … what a distorted world view!!! What thought process do you need to miss this point? Are you not getting that China relaxed some restrictions since 1979? Do you not believe that they relaxed some restrictions? Alternatively, do you think that those pre-1979 restrictions were in place to limit men? Or … my gosh … do you think that more freedom to choose hurts women? Or that men are more capable of taking advantage of that freedom? WTF?
* Do note that zero evidence is provided to support this assertion.
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