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Ethical Dilemma
An Unfair Haircut?
Illustration by Tom Garrett. iStockPhoto/Getty Images (shoes, girl); Adobe Stock (hairdresser, helmet, hair blower, t-shirts, shampoos, cash); Sabphoto/Shutterstock.com (boy); Lev Dolgachov/Alamy Stock Photo (hair)
I’m a girl with a short, boyish hairstyle. Is it fair that I’m charged more for a haircut than a boy with similarly short hair? —Yuki Murata, Santa Fe, New Mexico
ANSWER The length of the hair isn’t necessarily a reflection on the complexity of the cut: Rihanna sometimes wears short hair, but I’m sure her cut takes more time than the one given to Tom Holland. In general, women’s cuts are more complicated and time-consuming than men’s. It’s not unethical for salons to use a system that makes sense 99 percent of the time; all they need to do is recognize that exceptions exist. So if you tell a barber, “Give me the exact same haircut you would give a boy,” you should be charged the same price.
—Adapted from “The Ethicist” in The New York Times Magazine