The Fallacy of Higher Education and Equality
This article is written by our intern Heather Siu. She addresses the inequalities that women continue to face despite earning more college degrees than ever.
Higher Education is Not the Great Equalizer
Higher education has always been sold as the solution to social and economic inequality. It promises to reduce poverty, improve health, and enhance overall quality of life. But, like most things that sound too good to be true, it is.
Education is undeniably essential to the fight for equality; however, it is not the great equalizer.
Firstly, access to higher education continues to be incredibly problematic, often reflecting and reinforcing socioeconomic inequalities. Secondly, not everyone reaps equal rewards from earning the same degree. Studies confirm this is largely correlated to race and gender. To put it bluntly, earning a college degree does not magically make racial or gender discrimination disappear.
Women Can’t Win
The number of women attending university has massively increased over the years, to the extent that women currently outnumber men at all levels of higher education. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, women make up more than 56% of all college students. With more college-educated women graduating year over year, we could assume that female graduates are accessing the same, if not more, opportunities in the workplace. Yet the reality could not be more different.
Female graduates continue to face the gender pay gap. Prevalent across all industries with almost no exceptions, the pay gap also exists across all educational attainment levels. In fact, data shows that women with MBAs, one of the most prestigious and highest-earning postgraduate qualifications, suffer one of the largest discrepancies in earnings when compared to their male peers. The earnings gap can widen with more education - why is this happening?
MBA graduates typically start out at the same level. However, male graduates earn more throughout their careers and enjoy a bigger pay jump as little as three years after finishing their MBA. Studies show that those who pursue the highest-paying jobs see the most wage and career progression. At the same time, those who are unable to work long and inflexible hours lose the most. As earnings potential increases at the highest rate, we are often also looking to start a family. Graduate women are therefore particularly impacted. As many companies offer unequal parental leave policies, mothers are incentivised to take leave, rather than their partners. While on leave, many mothers default into taking on the majority of childcare and household responsibilities. These factors, combined with overwhelmingly expensive childcare, create an environment that facilitates many mothers putting their careers on hold, or returning to work part time. This is especially damning in the corporate world; being unable to work full-time dampens wage progression and impedes career advancement. This is evident when considering that women make up only 25% of C-Suite positions.
A college degree, therefore, does not guarantee equal footing in the workplace. No matter how qualified women are, how much women pursue the traditional avenues for success, or how much women do the “right thing,” the wage gap still manages to find us. As a result, other disparities also persist, including the huge chasm that is the gender pension gap - which is estimated at 30-40% across the globe. The system is stacked against women, and then some.
Black College Educated Women Are Not Protected
We’ve talked about intersectionality before and will not stop any time soon. In order to dismantle larger systems of inequality, we must recognize all experiences, especially experiences of the most marginalized folks. College education does not provide the same benefits to women of color, specifically Black women, anywhere close to those enjoyed by white peers. This is not only evident in the gender pay gap (Black women have a wider pay gap in higher salary occupations than in low-wage work), but is also made shockingly obvious in the racial disparity found in healthcare.
Studies prove that higher education reduces the risk of death among infants born to white mothers by 20%. Yet education as a ‘protective factor’ has zero impact on children born to Black mothers. As it happens, the infant mortality rate for Black mothers is consistently higher than white mothers at every educational level. This is illustrated in the following graph:
Source: Fighting at Birth: Eradicating the Black-White Infant Mortality Gap Report 2018
More worryingly, Black women are also THREE TO FOUR TIMES more likely to die from pregnancy and childbirth complications in America. Studies show that even when controlling for factors such as education, age, health and socioeconomic status, Black women are still more at risk. This is not unique to the States either; similar reports have been made about the UK. Multiple factors contribute to this overwhelming trend, but the root of the problem lies in racism.
Structural and interpersonal discrimination in health and social services result in poorer quality of care for Black Americans. There is already racial bias in how medical professionals may assess pain for Black patients. On top of that, living in an environment of systemic bias places pregnant Black women in a highly vulnerable position, not only exacerbating their mental and physical health, but also endangering the lives of their children. In a biological process called “weathering,” experiencing constant stress from racism directly results in early health deterioration.
This escalates for Black women with higher academic qualifications. Faced with increased discrimination and stress, as they attain higher levels of education, Black mothers with an advanced degree are at the most risk of losing their infant (refer to the earlier graph). A college education does not protect Black women.
So What Now?
Women may be earning more college degrees, but this alone does not solve inequality. It will never be enough when structures remain stacked against marginalized peoples, be it in the workplace or in healthcare. By acknowledging the fallacy of higher education, we can better understand how to confront these inequities that continue to push people down. This is why at Mirza, we are committed to empower individuals to navigate, and over time, change these very structures. Education is only a part of the solution, and we want to go all the way.
Our feminism, therefore, is not a feminism focused on the C-Suite. We want to create an inclusive future, which means our work today has to center around education, housing, food security, affordable childcare, and more.
To learn more about these issues and some steps you can take, check out these incredible initiatives:
