Talking about pay rates, and equality.
Once upon a time in a far off land there were approximately 8 individuals employed as Engineers within a manufacturing environment. Specialities included Optical, Electronic, Mechanical, Industrial. Because of my job I had access to pay scales. The highest pay went to the Optical Eng., he (yes a male) was a genius on, lets say $62,000; the second highest was a "Mech Eng" (job title) working as a tooling draftsman, on $61,000; then there was a gap to me as a Mech Eng on $42,000; a lady Industrial Eng, with two degrees (Electronics, Ind Eng) on $41,000, then there were about four young graduates two male, two female, all Electronics, all on about $35,000 each.
Nobody begrudged the Optical guy his dosh, he truly was a one off. The tooling draftsman was another case entirely, within his field (tooling for mills) he was excellent. Outside that field he wasn't much good at all.
cheers
Bill