Today’s Scripture Reading (August 25, 2016): Proverbs 11
The argument continues over the issue of equal pay for equal work. We hear it when our celebrities speak, and when our athletes talk. But the issue of equal pay for equal work is not all that straightforward. After all, every job is different, and the economic realities of each company are very different. According to my friends, I am vastly underpaid (or maybe they are vastly overpaid, but don’t tell them that.) I put in more hours doing the same job as they do and yet receive less money. Maybe, based on my reality I should campaign for equal pay for – and there is the question. My economic reality is different because of the economic reality of my church is different. No two jobs are alike. Would I like to be paid more? Sure. But the reality is that I could move to a different church and receive a higher paycheck, but I am willing, at least at this moment, to sacrifice wage for a church situation that I enjoy.
Researchers have noted this dichotomy in the equal pay argument. Men on the average are paid more than women. They also, on the average, tend to work longer hours and are willing to sacrifice comfortable working conditions for higher pay. Woman tend not to want to make that sacrifice. Do these differences account for enough of the wage gap? That is hard to tell. It is tough to evaluate when the two jobs have qualitative differences. On a personal level, a female friend of mine has a paycheck that exceeds many of her male colleagues working for the same company, but she is single and willing to work split shifts and lots of overtime. She is also ready to work in a variety of work situations and able to do the job competently. She has decided to trade comfort for money and is getting paid very well for that trade. Examples like my friends lead some to argue that the Gender Wage Gap is a myth. I am not sure that we have enough evidence either way to make the argument, but they might be right.
It is hard to read passages like this one without just a little hesitancy at the comparison between a man and woman. I can almost hear the women’s lobby screaming behind me as I write this that once again the woman gets shafted. After all, the woman of the passage gets honor while the man gets paid. But that might be a misreading of the text. It is a reading of the text according to our cultural values which places money at the top of our list of priorities.
What we might need is a more “Klingon (Star Trek)” reading of the text. For the Klingon, nothing is more important than honor. The Ferengi, on the other hand, are an exaggerated picture of Western society. For the Ferengi, all that matters is money. (And, by the way, the woman are kept barefoot and pregnant [and naked]. There is no equal pay.) The Klingon’s regard the Ferengi as being a people without honor, and in their world, there is no bigger insult. According to Klingon philosophy, not everything is about money – but everything is about honor.
This Klingon understanding is precisely the reading that needs to be brought into this text. The kind hearted woman excels at what is important – honor. The ruthless (this word has also been translated as vicious, violent or even just strong) man can only excel only at making money. The big, and possibly unanswerable, question of the text is whether or not only women can excel at honor and men at making money. My suspicion, and hope, is that this is not gender dependent. Men can obtain honor too – and it is something that we should all try to achieve, even more than we try to make money.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Proverbs 12
No comments:
Post a Comment