Two things are certain in this life, death and taxes. But, if you’re a woman, you can add just one more certainty to that list, the so-called “pink tax.” That’s the name for the pernicious retail phenomenon that sees women pay more than men for equivalent products and services.
GirlTalkHQ, a website that bills itself as “the global headquarters of female empowerment,” released a video on YouTube of their social experiment highlighting the unfair pricing practice.
A coffee shop in downtown Toronto, Tokyo Smoke, was hijacked by the website’s production team to set the stage. The café’s menu was changed to separate prices based on customers’ gender. Men were to pay significantly less than women, illustrating the price disparity in the general retail market. Hidden cameras were set up to record patron reactions.
“So, a man pays $2 for a drip coffee, and I pay $3.50 for it?” asks one female customer.
“So, this is discrimination, basically,” said another woman.
“I thought we were past that,” said a male patron.
Though GirlTalkHQ is based in Los Angeles, the editor-in-chief, Asha Dahya, told CTV News they shot the video in Toronto because Canada is making a difference when it comes to discrimination.
“Canada is kind of leading the way in terms of progress and equality because of one man in particular, Justin Trudeau,” Dahya told CTV Toronto.
“We’ve been following his lead-up to the election, when he was announced prime minister, everything he’s done in his office with making his cabinet half women and saying he’s a feminist. It was kind of a no-brainer from us. Canada and its prime minister seem to be leading the way on gender equality. So if we start there, I think that will set a good standard.”
The video has sparked outrage.
“So, not only do we sometimes have to pay more for things, but we get paid less for doing the same job,” one woman said.
The social experiment is aimed at garnering support for a petition to end the “pink tax” in Canada. GirlTalkHQ is hoping to reach a goal of 5,000 online supporters. Once they’ve hit their mark, according to the petition website, they will “approach Justin Trudeau and the Minister of Status of Women with a formal appeal” to end the imbalance.
The Girl Talk HQ petition had 962 supporters on Wednesday morning.
In 2014, a California state government study determined that women pay, on average, $1,300 more than men for the same products every year.
In the U.S., New York City and California have outlawed the practice of charging differently for products or services according to gender, and in California companies face fines up to $4,000 if they're caught breaking the law.
With files from The Associated Press and CTV Toronto’s Pat Foran
