By Shannon Montgomery
Women who are sick of paying obscene amounts for a haircut may soon get a welcome change.
Earlier this month, Ontario Liberal MPP Lorenzo Berardinetti introduced a private-member’s bill aimed at ending price discrimination on the basis of gender
He proposed the bill to the legislature after he discovered he paid less for many goods and services than his wife.
He says “the basic principle of this private member’s bill is to make it clear that a dollar in the hands of a woman should buy the same as a dollar in the hands of a man.”
The bill has ignited lively discussion on whether and why women are being charged more — for hair cuts, dry cleaning, and even deodorant.
His bill is important, but it’s missing half the point.
While it’s undeniable that women can easily find expensive clothing and haircuts, and other goods and services, it’s also possible for them to find such things as cheaply as men.
For example, if a woman goes to a barber, she will be charged the same amount as a man for the same hair cut. A quick perusal of a drug store shows that the lowest prices for both men and women’s deodorant and razors are comparable, although women have more highly-priced choices.
So a big part of this issue comes down not to why some merchants charge more and some products cost more, but why women are willing to pay these higher prices.
“If women organized and said they wouldn’t pay more for a blouse,” they wouldn’t be charged as much, says Suzanne Morton, a history professor specializing in women’s issues at McGill University.
She says there are reasons rooted in traditional female roles to explain why women don’t necessarily do this.
“I think (these reasons are) the link to femininity, and to beauty as a way women have defined themselves,” she says.
Morton says women will often pay more for something like moisturizer because, although it’s chemically similar to a moisturizer aimed at men and sold at a much lower price, the manufacturer markets it to appeal to a woman’s need to feel beautiful and feminine.
“Women have been willing to pay for a promise,” she says.
Cressida Heyes, a philosophy professor at the University of Alberta, agrees.
She is currently writing a book on plastic surgery, and how it isn’t necessarily about looking pretty, but rather changing identity, something she says can apply to women’s haircuts and clothing, as well.
“Women are so inevitably judged by what (they) look like that they’re willing to pay more because people believe there is a link between paying more and looking better,” she says.
“I think women are vulnerable to this type of rationale that if you’re paying more it’s a better service, and that’s particularly to do with appearance.”
Frances Woolley, a professor of economics at Carleton University says the problem isn’t that men and women are getting charged different prices at the same establishments, but that we live in a society where everything is “gendered.”
For example, she says that when her children were growing up, all diapers were unisex, but nowadays there are diapers for girls and for boys.
“You have to ask – how does something that used to be gender-neutral become gender-segregated?” she says.
This type of gender segregation means men and women are socialized to go to different places to get their hair cut and they are socialized to buy different products.
“All the men are getting their hair cut at the barber, whereas all women are going to someplace that costs more,” like a salon, says Woolley.
“That’s a major problem with this legislation. A lot of it is hard to enforce when you have this men’s business and women’s business operating separately.”
She adds this is similar to legislation trying to ensure women and men earn equal wages. She says while men and women almost never get paid different wages working side by side at the same job, they do tend to choose jobs that are paid on different levels.
For example, child care is a very low-paying field, and is populated primarily by women workers, because they have been socialized to gravitate toward jobs in the “care-sector,” like teaching or nursing. But it is difficult to legislate this as a discrimination problem.
“Is it a good idea to prevent people from discriminating, yes, absolutely,” she says. “How much (legislation) will actually stop things is very hard.”
As far as Berardinetti’s bill is concerned, Carleton philosophy professor Marvin Glass says that while there may be some small price discrimination, he’d need to see systematic studies and proof before he truly believes that this is something that needs to be changed.
“If for some reason women started shaving their heads and men started getting layered haircuts, then women would be paying less than men,” he says.
“The sexism is that shaved heads for women isn’t in.”
Glass says the bill is focusing on something that affects women in a small way, and is missing the other issues that have a greater impact on women.
“I’d rather they’d focus on equal pay and the glass ceiling in women getting ahead [in the workforce],” he says.