ROMNEY AND WOMEN

Yah. Yah. The women in binders joke is very funny.

What is more important is that Romney doesn't see that when he hires women it is not enough. Statistics show that women are paid less and promoted less often than men. It is the overall decision making regarding working women that is important.

Saying, "I hired a woman," is like saying, "I have a friend who is a Jew." Admirable, but not a solution to discrimination.

Women scientists have often complained of unequal treatment. To show the women that they were incorrect, a major university did a study. To their surprise, they found that women scientists were routinely given fewer resources than men. This was true even for women researchers who brought in their own research grants.

Discriminatory practices are done by individuals who often decide to have a clone of themselves promoted.

In order to fight this sort of discrimination, management needs to be trained, HR needs to pre-screen candidates, and statistics need to be kept. The only way to show a pattern of discrimination is to keep and report the numbers of people hired, the numbers of women hired, and the number of minorities hired. The same must be done for promotions.

Additionally, I believe that the US should make a course in non-discrimination mandatory before a person can get a work related visa.

I once taught a equal opportunity course to employees of a large engineering company. It was amazing to discover how ignorant of the law engineers could be. It was equally amazing to see how fast the engineers learned.

BTW, promoting beautiful women is not enough. In almost all endeavors, brains and education are more important than beauty and charm.