Lights, camera, pa
Contents
UWM econom
Feature Stories
Professor reveals Hollywood pay gaps Biologist pinpoints genes for fish nerves Alum protects vets from toxic exposures Prof wins grant for autism genetic research Geosciences grad mans Mars Rover camera Student’s internship to aid refugees Physics profs win grant for battery start-up L&S faculty win university service awards
p.2 p.4 p.6 p.8 p.9 p.10 p.11 p.12
Columns Laurels and Accolades People in Print In the Media Passings Upcoming Events Alumni Accomplishments
Published College the
the first
Tuesday
of Letters and
University
Contact
of
of each month by the
Science
at
Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
us at let-sci@uwm.edu or
p.13 p.13 p.14 p.15 p.16 p.17
Hollywood is a star-studded land of glitz, glam, and pay gaps. According to new research conducted by UWM labor economist John Heywood and his coauthors, female stars in the nation’s movie capital earn an average of $1 million less per film than their male counterparts when they perform in similar roles. The gap persists even accounting for actors’ experience, box office earnings, and a host of other factors. Heywood and his colleagues’ work has been highlighted on Bustle and in The Guardian. You found that there is a significant gender pay gap in Hollywood. What did your research reveal? What we found is that if you look at the raw gap between what men and women are paid in Hollywood at that “superstar” level, it’s an over $2.4 million difference. If you then throw all of the economist “bag of tricks” at it to try and figure out why – everything from how many John Heywood Twitter followers they have to how long they were involved in the profession, to how much time their filming took, what stunts they did, and all kinds of other things – we can get that “down” to about $1 million.
(414) 229-2923.
So all other things being equal, there’s still a $1 million pay gap. The only difference is the gender of the actors.
L&S Dean: Scott Gronert
Well, that’s an interesting question. That’s the first interpretation, that it’s the gender of the actors. But let me try to be a bit more specific about what might be going on.
In Focus Editor: Deanna Alba
One of the things that’s harder to explain is that males earn much more in an adventure movie than women do. That’s interesting; does that mean that the viewing public, when they see an adventure movie, like a male lead more? I’m
Find us at UWMLetSci
2 • IN FOCUS • October, 2019
