Legalizing Gender Inequality challenges existing theories of gender inequality within economic, sociological, and legal organizations. The book argues that male-female earnings differentials cannot be explained adequately by market forces, principles of efficiency, or society-wide sexism. Rather it suggests that employing organizations tend to disadvantage holders of predominantly female jobs by denying them power in organizational politics and by reproducing male cultural advantages. These findings contradict major legal precedents which have argued that labor markets and not employers are the source of inequality. The authors further argue that comparable worth is an inappropriate remedy, as such an approach misdiagnoses the causes of gender inequality and often falls prey to the same organizational processes that initially generated this differential. The book argues that the courts have, by uncritically accepting the market explanation for male-female wage disparity, tended to legitimate and to legalize a crucial dimension of gender inequality in American society.
- ISBN13 9780521627504
- Publish Date 28 May 1999 (first published 1 January 1999)
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 6 June 2022
- Publish Country GB
- Imprint Cambridge University Press
- Format Paperback (US Trade)
- Pages 412
- Language English