Fox News host: Women don't want equal pay, they already get 'exactly what they're worth'

Fox News host Martha MacCallum asserted on Wednesday that women did not want special laws ensuring equal for equal work because they already were compensated "exactly what they're worth."

After President Barack Obama used his State of the Union address on Tuesday to call on Congress to end workplace discrimination practices that "belong in a Mad Men episode," Fox News asked two men, liberal radio host Alan Colmes and Fox News host Tucker Carlson, to debate equal pay for women.

Carlson argued that women actually made more than men if the time they "voluntarily" took off work to raise children was factored in.

"The numbers don't lie," he insisted. "The losers in the Obama economy have been men."

MacCallum accused politicians of talking about female workers like they were victims "who we need to make sure she gets what she deserves."

"The numbers, when you look at them, do not bear out that there is a war on women in the workplace," the Fox News host added. "And I think it's a question of how liberals and conservative view what needs to be done for women."

"I disagree that there is not a war on women when they're not making as much as men for the same jobs," Colmes replied. "The numbers don't lie in terms of sick leave, pregnancy and women are forced out of the workplace when they have to leave."

MacCallum interrupted: "I think most women do not want to be treated as sort of a special class of citizen. They want to go every day, they want to get paid for being a professional for doing their job really well, and they don't want to be treated like some special group of people who have to be given a little special handout just to make sure they're OK."

"Special handout?" Colmes shot back. "It's equal pay for equal work, it's having sick leave, it's having pregnancy leave."

"Women get paid exactly what they're worth," MacCallum declared.

"Exactly what they're worth?" Colmes exclaimed. "Are they not worth the same amount of money for the same job as men?"

"They are worth a heck of a lot," the Fox News host remarked.

Carlson accused Colmes of being angry at the "biological reality" that women were paid less because they had to take time off work for pregnancies.

"I wonder how that would have been different if we had two women doing it," MacCallum said as the segment concluded.

Watch this video from Fox News' America's Newsroom, broadcast Jan. 29, 2013.