Storm in a cupcake or is it?

Earlier this year female students at Monash University decided to run a “cupcake” campaign that highlighted pay inequity that women experience in the corporate world.
The idea was unique and highlighted a key issue rather well; however they did create a storm in the process.

What they did was sell cupcakes and price them based on gender. If you were female you paid .80cents, if you were male you paid $1.00 and if you were transgender .60cents.

The students were accused of sexism and a social media storm erupted with their biggest critics being, men!

However I believe that this activity highlighted on a micro scale the gender pay inequality that exists today. Why not apply the theory that a male’s increased buying power allows goods and services to be charged more for? We could actually label this as positive discrimination.  

Great idea, fabulous way to highlight the issue and get discussion around it. However we wouldn’t really go down the path of actually endorsing men pay more than women? Or would we?

Let’s consider for a moment the fact that close to one in two couples get divorced, this means that more women are supporting families or living independent lives without a male partner to share the financial load.

This means that those women who are paid less than their male counterparts do have their buying power impacted and as a result their standard of living.

Less pay means they are also getting less superannuation which will impact them at retirement.

It also impacts their ability to invest in property or stock market to build wealth.

The inequality on cupcake pricing is a great way to highlight an issue that impacts women. The students may have sold cupcakes at a higher price to men, however the reality of pay inequality against women has a far greater impact.