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                Auburn University - University Relations
                            (334) 844-9999
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8/25/95                                  Bob Lowry (lowrygr@mail.auburn.edu)

AU ECONOMICS CHAIR AUTHORS BOOK ON SEX DISCRIMINATION

      AUBURN -- David Laband, chair of the Department of Economics at 
Auburn University, has published a new book that examines discrimination 
against women in the legal profession.
      The book, Sex Discrimination in the Legal Field, is published by 
Quorum Books, and is co-authored by Bernard Lentz, an economics professor 
at Urinus College in Pennsylvania. 
      Among the book's findings:
      ** Widespread evidence of sexual harassment of female attorneys 
by their male colleagues, and, to a lesser extent, their male 
supervisors, but little evidence of harassment from clients.
      ** Women are often the victims of subtle forms of discrimination, 
which cannot be easily proven in court.
      ** Gender-based differences in career patterns that developed 
before law school, but women who stick with the field are as likely as 
men to be made partners in a firm.
      ** Lower levels of job satisfaction among women lawyers than male
lawyers.
      ** Women are more likely than men to postpone having children 
because of their careers in law.
      ** There is no significant difference between hourly pay for male 
and female lawyers.
      Laband says there is little evidence that anti-discrimination 
laws have had much of an impact on the professional lives of female lawyers.
      "We disagree with Sen. Barbara Mikulski's (D-Md.) prescription 
that women can solve this problem by electing women to serve in the House 
and Senate," he said. "Legislation and lawsuits are, thus far, evidently 
not the answer. They have served to alter the form, but not the substance 
of discrimination against women in the legal workplace."
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aug95:AU-labandbook
CONTACT: Laband, 334/844-2903.
      (NOTE: Review copies of the book are available through the 
publisher at 202/226-3571, ext: 381.)