Walter Block on the Mythical Pay Gap

Professor Walter Block on the mythical wage gap:

The second nail emerges when we consider the exotic implications of the employer discrimination hypothesis of the pay gap. If this analysis were true, one would expect to find a systematic and positive relationship between profit levels and the number of women in the firm or industry.

It the idea that, all things equal, men and women have a level of parity when compared equally is ine worth considering. If employer discrimination were an issue, any such firm would be driven out of the market by an entrepreneur willing to hire a worker discriminated against. Men and women are equal, but also quite different, in regards to abilities and specialities. If not for those differences, we may see female construction workers and firefighters. In reality, women are better at a great many things, men excellent in a few as well...

From the Mises Institute:

His thesis is that discrimination -- choosing one thing over another -- is an inevitable feature of the material world where scarcity of goods and time is the pervasive feature. There is no getting around it. You must discriminate, and therefore you must have the freedom to discriminate, which only means the freedom to choose. Without discrimination, there is no economizing taking place. It is chaos.

The market embeds institutions that assist people in making the wisest possible choices given the alternatives. In this sense, discrimination is rational and socially optimal. For the state to presume to criminalize it based on social and political priorities amounts to a subversion of the market and of human liberty that leads to social conflict.

More: http://mises.org/document/6078 (don't give me any poor excuse for turning down a free book)

Block reminds us that there was a time when discriminating meant having the desirable ability to make an educated, informed choice.

Nothing more.  

Negative discrimination is purged from the free market, yet promoted by the state. Minorities will prosper by firms willing to hire minorities at lower rates, undercutting gluttonous competitors and driving themfrom the market. If we are to rid the world of it's evils, we must give ourselves the chance to do so. Block's Case reminds us that a better future is worth the fight. Those discriminated against find friend in liberty, not disparity. 

There's no state like no state.

And I feel like a nerd-punk voluntaryist fanboy: