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The Confusion and Expense of Pay Equity

One of the major difficulties faced by feminists today is the need for them to explain away their policies. When implemented, these policies appear to create more problems than they solve. Examples abound, but the most notorious in recent months has been the feminist policy of pay equity.

Pay equity is not the same as the more straightforward policy of equal pay for equal work, which means awarding women the same pay when they do the same work as men. Pay equity means determining wages according to the "value" of the work carried out in order to root out apparent gender bias and discrimination between male dominated and female dominated occupations in the same work place. That is, an evaluator determines and weighs the "value" of women's work in comparison to the "value" of other occupations dominated by men in the same place. Unfortunately, considerable difficulty arises in determining the "value" of a job. Obscure, complicated methodologies are applied which, in the end, are really only the opinion of the evaluator.

The Chrétien government in Ottawa has enthusiastically endorsed the policy of pay equity, which is the responsibility of the Federal Human Rights Commission to administer. The Canadian Human Rights Act does not spell out the mechanics for the determination of the "value" of federal jobs, so the Commission has been applying what critics refer to as "voodoo science" in doing so. This has inevitably led to years of bitter legal disputes that have cost taxpayers billions of dollars. For example, the Chrétien government ended up paying out $3.6 billion to its biggest union, the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) to satisfy a wrangle with its workers in six female-dominated occupations, from secretaries to librarians. (See Reality, September/October 1998, page 11, "High Noon for Pay Equity.")

In addition, both Bell Canada and Canada Post, who are also under federal jurisdiction, are currently involved in serious pay equity disputes. The complaint against Bell is the most substantial ever filed against a private-sector employer, which could potentially cost Bell $100 million.

The federal government has further problems arising over pay equity in that thousands of government-employed professionals are rebelling against the impact of this legislation.

The Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada (PIPSC), representing lawyers, doctors, nurses, engineers, scientists and computer analysts in the federal government, is deeply concerned about the new pay equity ratings, which indicate that invoice clerks may be paid as well as computer programmers, and secretaries the same as economists. This means that professionals within the government must either suffer a loss in pay or, at best, have their salaries frozen. In effect, lower-skilled workers - who generally make more than their counterparts in the private sectors - are ending up being overpaid under the new classification system.

The pay equity system also ignores market realities at a time when employers are outbidding each other for knowledge-based, professionally trained workers.

The Problem with Pay Equity

What strikes at the heart of pay equity is that it is not a human rights issue to be decided by the Human Rights Commission, but a labour issue which should be settled by negotiators at the bargaining table. Unions should not have the right to appeal to human rights tribunals to obtain raises they were unable to obtain by way of the collective bargaining process.

As a result of the mess created for the federal government by pay equity, feminist Justice Minister Anne McLellan, who oversees the Human Rights Commission, has quietly appointed the Dean of the University of Saskatchewan law school, Beth Bilson, to head up a task force to investigate and make recommendations in respect to the pay equity provisions of the Canadian Human Rights Act.

It is believed by many, however, that Ms. Bilson will be approaching her review from the wrong premise. Instead of examining the nonsensical concept of pay equity itself, she will, as a feminist, attempt only to tinker with the process and not even consider what is obvious to unbiased observers - that the entire pay equity concept should be abolished as unworkable and unfair.

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