经济学家也歧视女性

每天读点《经济学人》，今天要分享的是社论板块的一篇新文章，“经济学者中里也有性别歧视”。

一起玩味一下标题吧：Women and economics

Economics is uncovering its gender problem

 Uncovering gender problem 意思是，发现性别问题，这篇标题直接点出了经济学家这个圈子里存在的问题：女性在这个圈子里，像其他的一些理工行业一样，遭受性别歧视。女性常遭受歧视的行业可以所写为STEM：

For decades relatively few women have participated in STEM subjects: science, technology, engineering and maths.

当经济学人写到“性别歧视”、“环保”等老生常谈的话题的时候，一定会有特别的安排，要么是选题的新鲜点、要么是写作的笔法等，值得我们学习和注意。这篇文章中，作者使用了“类推”的方法。

首先是把经济学的核心问题，类推到经济学家行业中。经济学的核心问题，是在竞争中优化资源配置。注意里面一些关键概念的英文表达。AT THE HEART of economics is a belief in the virtues of open competition as a way of using the resources you have in the most efficient way you can. Thanks to the power of that insight, economists routinely tell politicians how to run public policy and business people how to run their firms. Yet when it comes to its own house, academic economics could do more to observe the standards it applies to the rest of the world. In particular, it recruits too few women. Also, many of those who do work in the profession say they are treated unfairly and that their talents are not fully realised.

AEA美国经济学家协会做了调查，得出了一系列不乐观的数据。Only 20% of women who answered the AEA poll said that they are satisfied with the professional climate, compared with 40% of men. Some 48% of females said they have faced discrimination at work because of their sex, compared with 3% of male respondents.

要如何解决经济学家圈子中的性别歧视问题呢，作者类推了经济学家们常用的研究方法，首先是收集数据。刚才美国经济学家协会的调查数据还远远不够。

To deal with its gender shortfall, economics needs two tools that it often uses to analyse and solve problems elsewhere: its ability to crunch data and its capacity to experiment. Take data first. The AEA study is commendable, but only a fifth of its 45,000 present and past members replied to its poll.  这个调查发下来，45000人中只有1/5的人回复了。More work is needed to establish why women are discouraged from becoming economists, or drop out, or are denied promotion. More benchmarking is needed against other professions where women thrive.

经济学人行业中女性视角的缺失，会导致他们学术上付出了相应的机会成本。比如，是不是在劳动力市场里，经济学家们对男性劳动者的关注是不是超过了女性劳动者？

And economics needs to study how a lack of women skews its scholarly priorities, creating an intellectual opportunity cost. For instance, do economists obsess more about labour-market conditions for men than for women? The more comprehensive the picture that emerges, the sooner and more easily action can be taken to change recruitment and to reform professional life.

最后，作者将经济学家研究的基本逻辑，类推到经济学家圈子本身的进步中。那就是识别问题，量化问题，寻找解决方案。

如果对经济学家圈子的改革，正符合经济学最基本的理论，那么经济学家们又怎么会不拥护呢？

Instead of moving cautiously, the economics profession should do what it is best at: recognise there is a problem, measure it objectively and find solutions. If the result is more women in economics who are treated better, there will be more competition for ideas and a more efficient use of a scarce resource. What economist could possibly object to that?