New Battleground: Parents v. Non-Parents

A new study was released at this month’s World at Work Conference revealing that mothers are less likely to be hired and more likely to earn less for the same job than their equally qualified female counterparts. (Interestingly, they found, the inverse to be true for fathers v. other men.)

I’m not sure what to make of it. I can’t say I’m shocked, but I also can’t say I’ve known anyone to face that particular bias. I am working for the same employer, in the same role now as I was before I had children. While I could be underpaid (and let’s face it, aren’t we all), I’m confident it has nothing to do with my parental status. But what bothered me even more than the study’s results was the bitter venom between moms and non-moms in the comments posted to BusinessWeek’s blog entry about the study.

To summarize, apparently there are an awful lot of women without children who think their parent-counterparts get away with luxurious hours off from work to attend their children’s every little whim. At the same time, there are a lot of moms who seem to feel that every “childless by choice” working woman is a cold, heartless, unattractive, fill-in-the-blank. Admittedly, that may be a bit of hyperbole, but what is clear is that there is a new battleground of bias in the workplace and parenthood, motherhood in particular, is smack in the middle of the fight. I suppose in some ways this is a natural sociological evolution in the overall movement for gender equity, but that’s exactly why it leaves me wanting to shout out to all women, moms and non-moms alike, “Can’t we all just get along?” Men have “Bands of Brothers.” Why does it seem like women have so much more trouble finding common ground, allegiance, and support.

-- New Mom