The wage gap between men and women is a perennially debated topic in the United States. Over the past few decades, it has become clear that a gap exists not only between men and women as a whole, but also between men and women when they hold the same position. In the 2020 United States Census, it was reported that women earn approximately 82% of the money that men do for every dollar earned (Elsesser). This has a huge impact on the lives that these women are able to live, forcing them to compensate for this loss of wage in comparison by either spending more time at work or by having a lower standard of living than their male counterparts. The film industry is one of the worst offenders, and is very clear when looking at the discrimination between the pay male and female actors receive for their roles in films and shows. In this essay, the disparity between male and female actors will be examined and decided if it’s sexist.
It is important to give background to the existence of gender wage-gap, as there has always been wage disparities between groups in the United States. As far back as the Industrial Revolution people have received vastly different wages for their efforts. The wages of workers in the factories were often well below the cost of living, as workers were paid around $0.10 an hour (Poddar). As a result, most of the people who worked in these factories lived in unhealthy conditions that consisted of many people living in a single-room apartment. Families who made this transition often could not sustain themselves on the wages of the husband alone, so the wife and even children went to work. The women who joined got jobs at factories quickly became the subaltern, as they often received between a third and half of the wage of the average male worker, despite performing the exact same tasks (Foundations of Western Culture). This is far from the first example of wage discrimination between men and women throughout history, but it is an important example of how women were treated as subalterns when society advanced into a more modern age.
While the rest of the country progressed both technologically and socially with the passing of the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution on August 18th, 1920. This advancement of social justice did not immediately extend to the workforce, as women were not required to receive equal pay until the Equal Pay Act was passed in 1963. This act was a step in the right direction, requiring employers to pay women the exact same wages as men for the same job. This act allowed for women to take legal action if it was determined they did not receive equal compensation to their male counterparts, but it has not come close to solving the issue. As stated earlier, women still receive on average only $0.82 for every dollar earned by a white male worker with the gap widening when looking at different races. As seen in the figure below, Asian women are the highest earning subsection of all women, making close to $0.90 per dollar a man earns.
Figure 1: The gender wage gap based on race (Bleiweis).
This is a stark difference from the $0.62 and $0.54 that Black and Hispanic/Latino women make respectively. This shows that women in the workforce are still considered to be inferior to men at the job they perform and are compensated as such. There still exists some debate about these numbers, however, as this analysis does not take into account the professions chosen by these populations. This can have a major impact on figures such as the one seen above, as it lowers the average earnings of women as a whole. This can be attributed to many women studying for careers that are producing lower yearly earnings than the careers of the typical man (Jacobs). This does not explain, nor defend, the existing wage gap but rather provide an explanation of how far the movement for equality of wages has come. There has been a major shift in the careers women choose from the early 1900s to today and the difference between the wages men and women receive has shrunk, but not nearly enough. Women are still portrayed as they are of lesser value than men, which is made abundantly clear by the fact that women composed approximately 45% of the workforce but only 20% of positions on company board of directors and an even fewer 5% are hired to be CEO of their companies (Jacobs).
An important example of the disparity that still exists between men and women’s wages is the difference in earnings of male and female actors in a film or show. Whereas many of the wage-gap arguments take place lower on the economic pyramid, both male and female actors are some of the highest-earning and are featured among the highest net worth of any industry. Many people would hear the outrageous sums of money that some actors can make off of a movie or chain of movies and assume that their actress counterparts are earning similar amounts for their roles. However, this is actually far from the truth, as women are often making fractions of what their male co-stars earning. This occurs even for actresses who are playing larger roles than their male counter parts, such as Robin Wright in House of Cards who had to negotiate with the producers to be paid the same as Kevin Spacey. There are plenty of examples of this occurring in the film industry, and even fewer examples of female stars getting paid equal or more than their male co-stars without serious negotiation. A great example of this discrimination happening in the film and television industry is the wage gap between Ellen Pompeo and Patrick Dempsey who played Meredith Grey, the titular character, and Derek Shepherd respectively in the extremely popular medical drama Grey’s Anatomy.
The two main stars of one of the most popular dramas on television for the past 15 years, Grey’s Anatomy, were paid vastly different sums of money during the early seasons of the show. According to Pompeo, it took years for Pompeo to negotiate a salary that was close to Dempsey’s despite her being the main, titular character of the drama. She stated that at one point she had asked to be paid only $5,000 more than Dempsey due to the fact that she show was named after her character, only to be rejected (Martin). The producers not only paid Dempsey more, but also used his character as a threat, saying “We don’t need [Ellen]; we have Patrick — which they did for years,” (Martin). Only after Dempsey’s departure from the show in 2015 was Pompeo given the highest contract on the show, where she was making over $500,000 per episode along with other incentives (Martin). She has, as some would say, secured the bag.
Figure 2: Salaries of male and female actors over the past thirty years (Pedace).
Now, Pompeo is one of the highest earning actresses in Hollywood these days, but there are still many issues concerning equal pay between male and female actors in Hollywood. Despite growing into a major role in House of Cards, Robin Wright had to negotiate heavily with the producers to get paid similar to Kevin Spacey (Muneer). Another example is Jessica Chastain, who co-starred with Matt Damon in the Martian, was payed significantly less for her role. Some reports state that she earned $7 million while Damon earned approximately $25 million, while other report that Chastain earned $2 million to Damon’s $18 million (Katz) (Muneer). The examples of women who are payed equal to the co-stars are even fewer, with one of the biggest shows ending over 15 years ago. Friends was an extremely popular sit-com that brought fame and fortune to all its actors, but only through the decision as a cast to negotiate equal pay for all actors as early as season 3 (Hedash). This needs to be a greater focus for producers and studios in the future. Actors need to understand that their fellow actresses are just as valuable to the projects they are undertaking and prioritize that while deciding what projects to work on.
Figure 3: The Friends cast negotiated for equal salary for each episode in the late 90s – early 2000s (Hedash).
This topic of unequal within the film and television industry may seem like a topic that is very different from the topics that have been discussed so far in class, but in reality it ties directly into it. In Hollywood, actresses are treated as the subaltern despite their irreplaceable impact on the industry itself due to the fact that they are not value the same as their actor counterparts. These women are in most cases literally given less value for performing the same role in a production. A potential counterargument to this topic relating to the topics discussed in class would be that these actresses are still earning somewhere in the hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars range for their roles while the majority of women experiencing this discrimination are working jobs with more realistic earning potential. This argument is invalid for a variety of reasons, such as many actors and actresses are not being paid millions of dollars to star in blockbuster movies, but are excited to get a minor role that has the slim chance of further success. The examples mentioned above are important examples of the problem that exists in the film industry, only at a much larger scale with successful actors and actresses instead of those who haven’t yet achieved success. A great example of an aspiring actress would be Penny from The Big Bang Theory, a woman who moves out to Hollywood with the dream of becoming rich and famous. While failing to become a successful actress, Penny accepts many badly paying roles in questionable projects all while living paycheck to paycheck. Penny is the typical aspiring actress who is treated as the subaltern by the film and television production world.
This topic is also an important discussion piece as actors and actresses are often idolized by people throughout the world. Children grow up watching these people and idolizing their every move. This is far from the only influence they have, as others who see actresses receiving less compensation than their actor co-stars may see this movement as further incentive to continue treating their own female employees as less important. Film and television has a huge impact on many people’s lives as so many people spend so much time watching it. As a result, the culture of treating women as if they are not as valuable as men in the production industry is something that needs to be changed. Actors and actresses provide an example for the rest of the world, so if actresses are treated with the same intrinsic value as actors, they will no longer be the subaltern of the acting world and potentially help change the way the wage gap is viewed in general.
The gender wage-gap has been an issue throughout the last century of the United States history. Women have always been discriminated against by employers and portrayed as the subaltern despite possessing the capability to perform the job to the same, if not better, standard as men. The film and television industry has long been one of the worst offenders of this as women often portray just as important roles as men, but are not valued as highly as them. If this important issue were discussed more it might bring a greater understanding and allow for one-more step to be taken so that the gender gap would no longer exist.
Bibliography
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