Espresso and Sexism

Published on Thursday, November 15, 2007, by Traci Vogel / Edit Post

We pay more for dry cleaning and haircuts, still earn 77 cents on the dollar compared to men—and now, outrage of outrages, it turns out women get bilked on the service end when it comes to coffee, too.

According to a piece in Slate, a study by economist Caitlin Knowles Myers found that men ordering coffee get their java 20 seconds earlier than women, at least in Boston-area coffee shops. This delay didn’t seem to have anything to do with how complicated the drink order was: Men ordering Venti half-caf gingerbread lattes with soy and sugar-free syrup and whipped cream stirred in still got their drinks faster than women ordering the same.

The gap in service time was larger when the staff was all male, and “almost vanished when the servers were all-female.” Not only that, but women deemed unattractive were served more slowly than the beautiful people.

The Slate columnist, Tim Harford, is baffled by the study results because they seem to go against an economic imperative: that a “business that deliberately offers shoddy service or uncompetitive prices to some customers, or that turns down smart minority applicants in favor of less-qualified white male applicants, is throwing money away,” and thus is bound to go under eventually. In other words, the market should correct discrimination. But in this case, it doesn’t.

Economic correctives or no, my theory as to why men get their coffee faster when served by other men is that males are competitive about everything. Some bizarre mind game no doubt occurs here, wherein the man ordering thinks, “I wonder how fast I’ll get my coffee,” while the man making the drink thinks, “I’ll show him just how fast I can make this coffee.”

Well, we women can play our own games, buddy. Next time my coffee takes too long, Mr. Barista can kiss 23 cents of his tip goodbye. Take that, free market!

But, wait: Am I then just playing into the stereotype that women don’t tip well?

I need more coffee before I can think this through.

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POST A COMMENT |7 Comments

COMMENT

  • Ok. I teach and love economics. So far what I've heard about this study is vague, but this is the most interesting commentary I've seen so far. I like questions about motivation and incentive, so:

    A couple of questions:

    1. Since we make 77 cents to the male dollar (and since boys have been raised as well with preconceived notions of what they should "expect" from us monetarily -- not saying...+READ

    Ok. I teach and love economics. So far what I've heard about this study is vague, but this is the most interesting commentary I've seen so far. I like questions about motivation and incentive, so:

    A couple of questions:

    1. Since we make 77 cents to the male dollar (and since boys have been raised as well with preconceived notions of what they should "expect" from us monetarily -- not saying I agree) wouldn't male servers have every reason to expect less in tips?

    2. Why wouldn't female servers respond similarly? Perhaps because they understand women?

    #2 probably correct for the most part. I've spent far too much time on both sides of the counter. And I'm a female.

    #1 is sketchy.If both assumptions of possible payoff are true then the most economical thing to do is get the "leach" out of the way for when a "paying customer" comes in.

    -- but then again maybe the payer gets to see the line "quickly dispatched" when he walks in the door and pays dearly for the performance... I doubt it.

    The shortest distance betweeen 2 points is a straight line. Why don't we just configure a short survey across our sample cities/towns that is handed to all the staff (but generally is meant to ask the male v female staff their motivations for service?

    I could analyze the results if we do the survey correctly...-COLLAPSE

  • In Model 5 customer gender is interacted with employee gender. The gender differential in wait times is estimated to decline with the presence of female employees. In a coffee shop with all male employees, a female customer waits an average of 37 seconds longer for her order than a male customer. However, in a coffee shop with all female employees a female customer’s wait i estimated to be 7...+READ

    In Model 5 customer gender is interacted with employee gender. The gender differential in wait times is estimated to decline with the presence of female employees. In a coffee shop with all male employees, a female customer waits an average of 37 seconds longer for her order than a male customer. However, in a coffee shop with all female employees a female customer’s wait i estimated to be 7 seconds longer than that of a male, a differential which is not statistically significantly different from zero. **Although the coefficient on the interaction term is not significant (with a p-value of 0.31), the result is suggestive that it is not order type but rather some action on the part of employees that is driving the result.**

    I don't agree with this conclusion at all. I think it's indicative of the likelihood that women do indeed order more complicated drinks and that male employees take longer with more complicated orders than female employees, the question then is, do male employees intentionally work slower on more complicated orders because of the "extra work" or because of the gender of the orderer?-COLLAPSE

  • I think the study has a major flaw in the categorization of drink types as binary; either fancy or not. IMO what they should have done was only considered certain drink orders and thrown out the rest of the data. For instance they'd keep time for those who ordered plain coffee and say something like a plain cappucino or mocha (I don't know about the possibilities here as I drink only plain...+READ

    I think the study has a major flaw in the categorization of drink types as binary; either fancy or not. IMO what they should have done was only considered certain drink orders and thrown out the rest of the data. For instance they'd keep time for those who ordered plain coffee and say something like a plain cappucino or mocha (I don't know about the possibilities here as I drink only plain coffee) and thrown out all data on drinks more complicated than that. IMO that would offer data with less variability.-COLLAPSE

  • "Did the study correct for customer pulchritude?"

    It claims to have done so - oddly enough, less "attractive" women were served even more slowly. (See paragraph 3, second sentence in the article above.) Although the test designer seems to have equated attractiveness with something to do with stylishness of clothing rather than physival appearance, which seems slightly odd.

  • Maybe men are more likely to get cranky if their order takes longer than they think it should, and are more likely to get cranky with a male barrista than a female.

  • Could be -- according to the Slate article "The delays facing women were larger when the coffee shop staff was all-male and almost vanished when the servers were all-female."

  • Maybe the male Barristas are just maximizing their oggling time. Did the study correct for customer pulchritude?