Welcome to Season 1, episode 4 of Breaking with Tradition, Catalyst’s podcast that explores trends and ideas that will impact the future of the global workplace. This episode is called Women Money Power.

We know that women across the globe make less money than men. The gap may vary among countries, but it is a persistent pattern caused by a variety of systemic factors including job segregation, differences in education, and a lack of pay transparency, discrimination, and bias.

Some would say, however, that the gender pay gap is because “women aren’t ambitious.” And financial journalist and author Josie Cox has a lot of evidence to the contrary.

Join host Lucy Kallin as she sits down with Josie to discuss her latest book Women Money Power: The Rise and Fall of Economic Equality. Together, they discuss the century-old workplace design that holds back working mothers, recent legislative efforts to make salaries more transparent, as well as the trailblazing women who have contributed to the seismic progress in women’s economic empowerment we have today.

How can companies and employees work collectively to close the gap and create workplaces that better support people of all genders, including men? Listen to find out!

Hosts and guest

Lucy Kallin, Executive Director, EMEA, Catalyst

LinkedIn | Bio

Josie Cox is a journalist, author, broadcaster and public speaker. She’s worked on staff for Reuters, The Independent and The Wall Street Journal. As a freelancer, she’s covered the intersection of gender and the economy for The Washington Post, The Spectator, Guardian, Business Insider, MSNBC, Forbes and other publications.

Josie has appeared on CNN, ABC, PBS, CNBC, public radio and a host of other networks. She regularly contributes to the BBC, both as a writer and broadcaster and is a founding editor of The Persistent.

Website | LinkedIn

In this episode

• 1:04 | Are women less ambitious than men? Josie and Lucy discuss the myth of the "unambitious mother."
• 6:22 | Breaking away from false perceptions. What can individuals and companies do to combat bias?
• 12:54 | Trailblazers in Women Money Power Josie talks about some of the women who changed history under the radar.
• 20:08 | Is gender equity a zero-sum game for men? We still tend to frame gender as a woman’s issue.
• 24:22 | Pay transparency regulation. Is it effective? What are some of the bright spots?
• 29:12 | The main takeaway from Women Money Power. Lucy asks Josie what she hopes readers get from her book.

Favorite moments

• 4:40 | Josie: And I think what we have to do, and it’s our duty as a society, is to recognize that when it looks like a woman might not be as ambitious as a man, we have to ask ourselves: what are the parameters, the constructs, the infrastructure that are preventing her from being able to make the choices that make her look ambitious in the way that we understand ambition?
• 5:52 | Lucy: It’s not about fixing the women... It’s about changing the infrastructure where women are working and making them more accessible and places where ambitions are allowed to grow, whatever that might look like. Because I do believe that organizations that do that will be the ones that will be around for a long time and will be successful.
• 6:49 | Josie: We need to be able to have conversations in the workplace that shed a light on the lived experiences of people who are perhaps not always given the opportunity to be the most vocal.
• 7:44 | Josie: On an operational level, what I would really like to see is organizations that have the courage to really self-reflect and say, okay, why am I doing the things I’m doing? And what is this design rooted in?
• 10:50 | Josie: And one of the most interesting things that I saw coming out of the pandemic—before corporations snapped back to the pre-COVID way of working—was this openness to hybrid working. We saw a steep rise in women’s labor force participation among women with young kids. And that was because they were finally able to do their work in the paid labor market from home, around their caregiving responsibilities they have.
• 22:49 | Josie: When we talk about gender inequality, a) we still tend to frame it as a women’s problem. In workplaces, conversations about the gender pay gap still tend to be the domain of women. On the other hand, b) we haven’t really spent enough time considering the role of men in the unpaid labor market and really advocating for changes there. I think it is our duty to address the other side of the equation.
• 28:06 | Josie: [Companies need to] spell out the effect that pay transparency can have on your organization. If you abide by not just the letter, but also the spirit of
• [transparency] laws, if you create that transparency, and therefore that trust within your workforce, you are undoubtedly likely to have a better retention rate.

Mentioned on the Pod

• U.S. Department of Labor Mothers’ employment has surpassed pre-pandemic levels, but the child care crisis persists
• Business Insider: A History of How the 40-Hour Workweek Became the Norm in America
• PBS: Katharine Dexter McCormick (1875-1967)
• The New Yorker: The Many Lives of Pauli Murray
• Amazon: Of Boys and Men: Why the Modern Male Is Struggling, Why It Matters, and What to Do about It

Research you can use

• Women's Earnings: The Pay Gap (Quick Take)
• HR, Take Note: Employees Want Pay Transparency. Smart Companies Are Listening.
• Equal Pay Starts With Pay Transparency: Step-By-Step Guide for HR Leaders
• 5 Ways To Close The Gender Pay Gap
• Time Is Ticking for the EU Pay Transparency Directive
• Survey Finds Four in Ten Working Mothers Likely to Change Jobs Because of Childcare Issues