Is the Gender Pay Gap Real?: An Example of Data Manipulation Tactics
- Allie Lorton
- Dec 13, 2020
- 3 min read
*THIS IS MISREPRESENTED DATA THAT IS AN EXAMPLE TO SHOW HOW EASILY PEOPLE CAN TRY TO SWAY YOUR OPINION BASED ON HOW THEY PRESENT INFORMATION. THIS IS NOT FACTUAL AT ALL! THE END PROVIDES AN EXPLANATION OF THE DATA MANIPULATION TACTICS USED.
Though there is much speculation on the subject, when you look at the facts it is clear that gender pay gaps in professional athletics doesn't exist. Female athletes can make just as much as male athletes. On Forbes top paid athletes list for 2020, you can find female athletes Naomi Osaka and Serena Williams in the top 35, among golfer Tiger Woods, basketball player Stephen Curry, and tennis player Rafael Nadal. Right up there with all the boys, they bring in dozens of billions of dollars of endorsements per year. In an article by the Miami Herald on the U.S. Open, one of tennis’ most prestigious events, they said, “The woman who wins the 2019 U.S. Open tennis tournament this weekend will take home a record $3.85 million in prize money — exactly the same amount that will be awarded to the men’s winner” (Kaufman). There is the exact same prize awarded to the female winner as the male winner. No sexism, no gap in pay, a true display of equality. Not only this, but in an article on salary.com the author adds, “Since 2007, all four Grand Slams – The Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon, and U.S. Open – payout equal prize money to their male and female winners” (Harrison). Once again, this shows how even if it hasn’t been fair forever, in today’s day and age payout for even the biggest events are the same. Even between the tennis organizations who supply players’ salaries reflects this lack of gender discrimination. In an article by the Chant exploring the pay gap or lack thereof further, they shared this graphic showing that female tennis players make even more money off salary than their male counterparts. If that doesn’t show that female athletes aren’t being discriminated against, I don’t know what could.
In an article on payscale.com asking the question of if there is a pay gap in sports, they share a graph displaying the money a certain percentage of workers receive in men’s vs women’s sports:
As you can see, the graphs match up pretty well. When you begin to follow the slopes down to the right, you can see that between 90 to 120,000, a higher percentage of women make that much. Even in the higher salary amounts, women on average are making more. If anything, this is reverse sexism. Women are making more than men. Overall, it is clear that the gender pay gap in professional athletics doesn’t exist as women are getting paid the same if not more for winning events and just from salary.
ONCE AGAIN, NONE OF THAT WAS TRUE. ALL DATA WAS MANIPULATED AND THE VIEWS OF THE ARTICLE DO NOT REFLECT THE PERSPECTIVE OR VALUES OF THE AUTHOR. READ BELOW TO SEE HOW THE DATA WAS MANIPULATED.
Data Manipulation Tactics:
1. Leaving Data Out
The data reported in the first section was specifically on tennis, as it is one of the only sports that is taking action to make pay fairer.
In the graph by payscale, the x-axis only goes up to around 150,000 dollars, when the true difference is shown higher as many male athletes make above six figures.
2. Misleading and incomplete data
In the graphic put by the chant, only part of the full picture was shown. The full picture (below) includes sports with incredibly high pay gaps and text sharing that tennis is an outlier in that it is fairer.
3. Connecting Unconnected Data (Correlation vs causation)
Once again, by only using tennis as an example but then saying that proves that all sports have no pay gap is connecting two things that just don’t connect. Specifically, this the the Texas sharpshooter as by itself it could be convincing, but with the larger picture, it just makes no sense.
4. Logical Fallacies
Literally, the whole article is a fallacy. The real data shows that gaps in pay do exist, so the whole story is built on a bunch of nothing. Every statement made is false because the perspective it is based upon is false. It could be compared to explaining why unicorn horns are so sharp even though unicorns don’t actually exist.
Citations:
Harrison, Connor. “Examining the Gender Pay Gap in Sports.” Salary.com, Salary.com, 15 May 2019, www.salary.com/articles/examining-the-gender-pay-gap-in-sports/. Accessed 14 Dec. 2020.
Kaufman, Michelle. “How Big Is the Gender Pay Gap in Sports? It’s Much Bigger than You Think. Here Is Proof.” Miamiherald, Miami Herald, 2019, www.miamiherald.com/sports/article234425642.html. Accessed 14 Dec. 2020.
Kish, Haley. “Gender Wage Gap with Professional Athletes.” The Chant, 2019, nchschant.com/17512/investigative/gender-wage-gap-with-professional-athletes/. Accessed 14 Dec. 2020.
“The World’s Highest-Paid Athletes 2020.” Forbes, 2020, www.forbes.com/athletes/#4b7193f255ae. Accessed 14 Dec. 2020.
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