NBC Uncritically Peddles New Twist to ‘Pay Gap’ Myth: Boys Get Bigger Allowances

April 24th, 2014 11:49 AM

A day after the liberal website Think Progress wrote a piece complaining “There’s Even A Gender Gap In Children’s Allowances” the folks over at NBC rushed to tie the issue to the “pay gap” between men and women.

On Thursday, April 24, Today show co-host Matt Lauer hyped “We all know about a pay gap that exists for adult men and women in the work world, but there are surprising new numbers this morning revealing that that gap actually begins during childhood with the allowances we pay our kids. In a new survey, 70% of boys say they get an allowance. That’s compared to just 60% of girls.” [See video below.] 

Co-host Natalie Morales expressed shock at the so-called “pay gap” exists among children and complained “It’s true. Even though another study finds that girls spend more time doing chores. So basically, girls are doing more for less. This sounds kind of familiar right?

Despite the NBC crew expressing outrage over the mythical “pay gap”, their story backfired on them when Morales reported “We asked you on our Facebook page. Do you think a gender gap exists when it comes to kids’ allowances? 87% of you say no. 13% saying yes."

NewsBusters has extensively documented how NBC and its sister network MSNBC have repeatedly pushed the false statistic that women earn 77 cents of what men make, so it should come as no surprise that Today would pick up on a piece from the liberal Think Progress.

NBC has a history of championing liberal issues, such as “equal pay” including on January 29 when Morales cheered on Obama’s call for women’s equal pay and proclaimed “Let’s make this happen.” Despite NBC’s repeated efforts to champion the “pay gap” myth, they ignored the White House hypocrisy on equal wages for men and women.

See relevant transcript below.


NBC

Today

April 24, 2014

8:12 a.m. Eastern

MATT LAUER: We all know about a pay gap that exists for adult men and women in the work world, but there are surprising new numbers this morning revealing that that gap actually begins during childhood with the allowances we pay our kids. In a new survey, 70% of boys say they get an allowance. That’s compared to just 60% of girls.

NATALIE MORALES: What? Okay. It’s true. Even though another study finds that girls spend more time doing chores. So basically, girls are doing more for less. This sounds kind of familiar right? The shock, I think this is going to shock a lot of you and we asked you on our Facebook page. Do you think a gender gap exists when it comes to kids’ allowances? 87% of you say no. 13% saying yes.  We had a whole discussion about allowances and–

LAUER: We pay our kids the same amount boy or girl but I will be honest with you,, my daughter does more for her allowance in terms of chores than I think my son does.

DYLAN DREYER: Here’s my allowance when I was a kid. My dad said, do you have a roof over your head? Do you get fed? Yes. Okay then go back to work.

CARSON DALY: What if you put a price tag per chore.

TAMRON HALL: Like a scale.

DALY: Like a scale. And if one of your kids wants to do more they can earn more. But it’s still five bucks per thing.

HALL: So with your admission are you going to change the pay scale so that your daughter gets more?

LAUER: I think that I’m going to have to do it. I’m going to tell the kids that the Carson Daly scale is now in effect.

DALY: Yes, you owe me.