Danish court rules men's and women's haircuts should cost the same

[dead0man]

and that is freaking stupid.
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[I spent the winter writing songs about getting better]

Makes sense to me. Sound ruling.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

If the argument for the price differential is that women have longer hair and thus take longer to cut, then basing the price on hair length rather than gender seems fair.

[Hatman 🍁]

As Ernest said, easy solution: base it on hair length.

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

As Ernest said, easy solution: base it on hair length.

I don't see why anyone would do it any other way.

[CatoMinor]

Joke court.

[MrWesten]

This is actually quite interesting. She is making it a gender case. However, most countries make payment rulings based on time vs effort. I for one would love it if the judge was a female. I wonder how many women have long hair there.

[politicus]

You cannot under Danish law base a price difference simply on gender, there needs to be an objective criterion. On average women have longer hair than men, but that's no reason to charge all women a  higher price.
If you don't like the equal treatment principle - or think the government should mind its own business - you can call it a "joke law", but the court was simply doing its job interpreting the law. No other outcome was really possible in this case. So you cant reasonably call it a joke court.

[opebo]

Denmark is certainly a joke.  However, maybe they can create a new export industry with the byproduct of all this:  Viking testicles.

[politicus]

Denmark is certainly a joke. However, maybe they can create a new export industry with the byproduct of all this:  Viking testicles.

The idea that treating men and women equally emasculates men is quite ridiculous.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Denmark is certainly a joke. However, maybe they can create a new export industry with the byproduct of all this:  Viking testicles.

The idea that treating men and women equally emasculates men is quite ridiculous.

Shh, Opebo thinks repeating centuries-old clichés makes him witty.

[opebo]

Denmark is certainly a joke. However, maybe they can create a new export industry with the byproduct of all this:  Viking testicles.

The idea that treating men and women equally emasculates men is quite ridiculous.

Shh, Opebo thinks repeating centuries-old clichés makes him witty.

Guys, anybody that thinks a woman's haircut and a man's are typically the same is rather inexperienced in the world.

[Ebowed]

Guys, anybody that thinks a woman's haircut and a man's are typically the same is rather inexperienced in the world.

But if a man and a woman have the same hairstyle and length, clearly the haircut should cost the same.

[memphis]

Is car or life insurance equally priced there as well? 

[Franzl]

Is car or life insurance equally priced there as well? 

It is here now, but that's a very recent thing.

[ingemann]

Is car or life insurance equally priced there as well? 

Not the same thing as insurance are based on average risk based on your age, gender, lifestyle and family history, while a hair cut are specific pierce of labour, which can be measured (time and resources used per hair cut).

[Silent Hunter]

Women tend to have longer hair than men... so any cost based on length is inherently discriminatory.

[Gustaf]

Women tend to have longer hair than men... so any cost based on length is inherently discriminatory.

Eh, no. That's not what discrimination is.

It should be noted that as far as I know, this is not a Danish law - it's an EU law, although I think it's ignored in many places.

[TNF]

Sounds good to me.

[TDAS04]

This court is going a bit too far.

[Franzl]

This court is going a bit too far.

In your opinion, what is a court's purpose?

[TDAS04]

This court is going a bit too far.

In your opinion, what is a court's purpose?

To interpret the Constitution and law, and to throw out unconstitutional laws.  Well, I'm not as familiar with the Danish judiciary, so maybe I'm wrong.  The court may be doing the appropriate thing in Denmark, or the European Union.  In the US, this would be silly, but I suppose that a Danish court can do what it pleases.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Why would it be silly in the United States? Charging women and men different amounts for an otherwise identical service is prima facie discriminatory.

[TDAS04]

Why would it be silly in the United States? Charging women and men different amounts for an otherwise identical service is prima facie discriminatory.

I don't feel that strongly about this, I'm just saying that every form of equality in every way is impossible.  It would be awful to force a woman to pay more for the same labor/time-consuming haircut than a man would pay.  I don't know everything about this case, so I may have misunderstood and assumed that Denmark was attempting to artificially make the average female haircut cost the same as a man's.  That would be ridiculous, and if women on average request more complicated haircuts than men, people should just live with that.  There are plenty of things for which men may, a on average, be more fussy than women.  For those things, it would be stupid for men to complain about having to pay more than the average woman.  That's what I thought this issue was about, but maybe I was wrong.  If the service is identical, then yes, women shouldn't have to pay more than men.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Why would it be silly in the United States? Charging women and men different amounts for an otherwise identical service is prima facie discriminatory.

As the Civil Rights Cases made clear in 1875, there is no directly judicially actionable ability of the Federal government to intervene in private discrimination.  The later Civil Rights Act of 1964 made use of Congress' Commerce Power.  Hence in the US context, if Congress were to pass a law requiring the same price for men's and women's haircuts, it would be considered a valid use of the Commerce Clause, but absent such a law, a court or an administrative tribunal could not issue a ruling such as the one the Danish Board of Equal Treatment issued.