Equal Pay for Equal Work -- It's About Time!

Nine years into the 21st Century -- and here we are -- FINALLY -- with a Congress and a president ready to put the final signature on legislation that will help ensure equal pay for equal work -- no matter what your gender, race, national origin or religion happens to be.

It's a new day in Washington. After years of Congressional Republicans holding up the equal pay provision, Democrats in the House and Senate swiftly passed the bill. Tomorrow, the first bill that our new president will sign into law will be equal pay for equal work. How proud President Obama must be.

More importantly, what a great moment this will be for the millions of women and minorities in our country who have worked just as hard as their counterparts, but paid substantially less because of their gender or color of skin. This critical moment should be celebrated in every community and in work places across our great country.

I've never understood why Republicans and some Democrats have opposed the equal pay provision. How could you? Don't pretend to be a leader and say that your represent the people when you stand in the way of simple fairness and equity. I know Senate Republicans are dominated and controlled by older white men who have stopped this provision from getting a vote over the years. What I don't understand is how female Republican Senators like Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Elizabeth Dole couldn't show enough leadership to get this out of the Senate. Or why they would even stay in the Republican Party when their male counterparts continue to keep them down.

If anyone every asks you, "does it make a difference which political party controls Congress," I hope this is one clear and important example of what a difference it will make in the lives of millions of Americans who have suffered from discrimination in the workplace, that under Democratic control, equal pay for equal work will now be the law of the land.

I expect this is just the start of an important progressive agenda as change takes over Washington.

Comments

[Artemrs]

After reading the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act it makes it very clear that Plaintiffs would still have to satisfy a number of requirements to be able to sue, including filing a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission within 180 days of the last discriminatory pay check, policy or action. It would NOT make it easier to sue, and would NOT create more law suits. Remember this is not only a Fair Pay Act for women, but for all who may be discriminated against in the workplace. These archaic practices may not always be blatantly obvious to those who are not aware, but they exist and it is something to be celebrated.

[jojojo]

Yes. The spirit of this is good, of course, but where can one find the actual wording of this? Will it allow for things like seniority? Or will a newcomer get paid what a 10-year veteran gets paid?

What I'm getting at is wondering if a well-intentioned bill will lock in other unjust practices.

I've had co-workers--male and female--who had the same job title but who did much less work than their colleagues. Should these people get paid the same as the folks who do much more and better work? With the female employees particularly, i've had bosses who wanted to fire thmen and women who were loafers, but were not allowed to fire women for fear of gender-based lawsuits.

It's good idea, of course, but are these things explicitly thought through as well?

[drayak]

I don't understand the equal pay for equal work? I agree if a male or female, black or white are let's say a fork lift operator on a loading dock they sould be paid the same. Unless, the union has interferred and the male is a new hire and works for 80% vs the 100% female or visa versa. This happens everyday in this country. As for equal pay: I've worked these jobs--Septic System installer, Military, Auto Sales, Outside Sales, Warehouse person, Information Tech, Delivery Driver, Window maker, Electronic part maker, Steel mill employee, and Realtor. With the exception of the ones (Auto sales, Outside sales, and Realtor) that paid by commission, there was never any difference between male/femal­e/white/bl­ack or other in pay. The difference only came with new hires, and job differences. There was no ryhmn or reason to the pay scale, heavy work didn't always pay as well as light work. Window builder didn't come close as Information tech, and I worked in much harsher conditions (no heat in winter, no air conditioner in summer) longer hours and forced overtime. Not to mention an increased level of injury(s). I hope the bill isn't so open to interpretation that we now have workers stating they should be paid better than managers (after all they build the produce, not act as cheerleaders on the side line rooting everyone on).

[deneufeldt]

I think you are missing the point which is women and minorities get paid less for the same job the white man sitting next to her gets. If I manage 150 people and Joe does too who do you think gets paid more? Also, regarding commissions: if the woman got 6% for the same sale as her male counterpart who got 10% that would also be discriminatory. This has nothing to do with workers getting paid more than managers or light work versus heavy work. This is about equality and fairness. This is about an equal playing field for all, which is a wonderful thing. It is too bad we need a law to make employers do the right thing. President Obama understands all this and I am putting my confidence in him. He will do the right things for all of us. No one should ever be afraid of equality and fairness.

[overd0g1]

Nobody should be afraid of fairness. Everybody should be afraid of the government implementing it.

[000Jade000]

Steve,

Yes, it's exciting. Very exciting. However . . . yes, there has to be a however, the most important progressive changes we need now are tax policy changes, and other measures that will reverse the extremely dangerous income and wealth disparities that exists in this country. I wish the President would ditch Larry Summers and hire on Robert Reich, because Reich seems to be the only person who really understands the depths of our structural economic problems.

[escribacat]

I will never forget the shock I felt when I got a male friend of mine a job at the high tech company where I worked. He had no experience and was brought in at a higher salary than I was making (I'm female). Wow. That was an eye-opener. That was 25 years ago. I can't believe it's taken this long to fix that travesty.

[overd0g1]

Boo hoo. I'm sure plenty of women got paid more than you too.

[Philip N. Cohen - Huffpost Blogger]

Nothing wrong with this law - it's in the right direction and I'm glad to see it, but it's not "equal pay for equal work." It's a moderate improvement on the current law, which permits disparities in pay as long as job titles are different. I reported on this previously here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/philip-n-cohen/what-does-equal-pay-for-e_b_123997.html.

[InternationalObserver]

Thanks for the link. Your blog discusses the exact reason why I want the 'Equal Pay Equal Work' law to be job specific. Male and female teachers (etc) should be paid the same, no argument there.

But you lose me when you start arguing that Apples should get the same pay as Oranges because they're both fruit.

Employment Courts will be bogged down overnight if we have to start deciding whether a Dry Cleaner should get the same as a Lab Technician. Because next the Laundry Workers will argue that their job is similar to a Dry Cleaner, who's now getting the same as a Lab Technician (because they both work with dangerous chemicals).

[Philip N. Cohen - Huffpost Blogger]

That is a risk. But the "bogged down" thing just doesn't seem as bad to me as the unequal pay thing. I think there would be lawsuits, and the courts would need Congress to establish some standards, which would require a bureaucracy, which would stifle the free market at least a little - but maybe not fatally. I think one moderate-sized new office building full of bureaucrats could handle it. Bigger than a breadbox but smaller than the Energy Department?

[littlepitcher]

Agreed. But when the same laboratory pays the part-time male employee in bookkeeping a higher hourly rate than they do for the full-time women in that department, something is definitely wrong (as the Feds found out when they convicted the lab, not of discrimination, but of multi-million billing fraud).

And it's even more wrong when the women get references to poorly-paid work, but the man is given references to an employment agency job.

[Docbcs]

A definite step in the right direction. Now, what we have to watch out for is employers describing jobs differently when they are performed by women as opposed to men. This can be an end run around an "Equal pay for equal work" law.

[Car84]

In large part, the Lily Ledbetter Law addresses how the statute of limitations should apply to wage discrimination cases. To that, a bunch of grants and programs and reporting requirements have been added.

If things work out as they should, women with less experience, or who value the mommy track more than the carrer track (whom I applaud more than do those "people who are concerned about womens' rights"), or who are truly less qualified and valuable than their male counterparts will continue to be paid less.

In the end, generally, women end up with the money because men die sooner. How are we going to address that disparity?

[KUVVY]

If the work that is being done is done equally by either sex I am all for it,in my experience­(firefight­er,builder­) the equal ends when the job begins. Its hard for some people to admit but some jobs are done better by one gender. The female firefighters that I worked with were a joke and demeaned the job. In construction females were somewhat competitive with their male counterpart but most males could do this type of work better and quicker. We cannot legislate competence based on sex and expect to have a competitive workforce

[JustMyWords]

And you're missing the point entirely. Aside from the idiocy that "some jobs are done better by one gender," that is. No one has ever said that all employees, even with the same job, should be paid the same forever and ever, amen. An employee doing a better job should get better pay raises based on merit. But that employee shouldn't have gotten a headstart by being paid more in the first place.

I worked in law enforcement for almost 20 years, and was very good at what I did. On one occasion, I had a supervisor tell me that he had to give me a lower raise because the other person in the same job "needed" more money than I did because he had a family. Not that the man doing the same job was better than I am - I actually got a better review - but that, being male, he deserved more money. (The same supervisor suggested that I should get married so my husband could support me.) I had another supervisor inform me, publicly, that he was opposed to my being promoted because "there are a lot of guys that want that job."

You can't legislate competence, but you can sure require people to treat competence fairly.

[rmm4402]

This is lousy, no substance - make yourself feel like you did something - bad solution to a non-problem piece of legislation.

As usual, the only winner here will be trial lawyers. They must be jumping for joy. I am sure they have lawsuits all lined-up.

I don't even know who these "victims" are....

I am sure we'll all find out as the lawsuits begin.

I suspect the brunt of this will fall on middle-sized and small companies with ambiguous job descriptions and where people are forced to wear many hats. Of course these are the comapnies that have to fight to survive - they are not eligible for any bailouts from anyone but for some reason seem to employ an awful lot of people. In those businesses people negotiate their own salary.

Are all 2nd basemen paid the same??? How about all quarterbacks ?? Morning show hosts?? News anchors ??

Negotiate your own salary and live with what you negotaited.

But of course now you don't have to....... Big Brother will take care of it for you. But really he won't. Because if there is a disparity in pay - there is usually a disparity in talent. And with the way business is these days - if you even suspect you will have to give an undersving person a raise - they will be cut.

Of course - there's another lawsuit...... the beat goes on and the racket that is our legal system continues to fix the game for

[singlet1060]

IT IS ABOUT TIME THAT WE HAVE EQUITY IN PAY.

[skid76]

And they said irony is dead...the Republicans idea of parity pay is to put everyone out of work...we're all making nothing. Now we get parity when so many are out of a job.

[InternationalObserver]

I've got no problem with equal pay for equal work as long as it's the same job. A male call centre operator should get the same as a female call centre operator. A female bus driver should get the same as a male bus driver.

The problem comes with the second part of this feminist* agenda. "Equal Work" does not mean "The Same Job". The next argument will be that a Registered Nurse should be getting the same as a First Year Doctor because they have similar responsibilities. A bus driver should get the same as a truck driver because they both operate heavy vehicles (and the bus driver should get more in fact because they have to deal with customers and are responsible for their safety).

Again, I've got no problem with equal pay for equal work as long as it's the same job ie we're comparing apples with apples.

* NB - I refer to this as a feminist agenda because it has been driven by the feminist movement and the examples they cite are of women recieving less than men - even if sometimes they are comparing apples with oranges.

[drock973]

They also conveniently leave out such things as hours worked, college degrees, experience, and how many years you have on the job.

[EasyCheese]

They also leave out the whole payed time off for having a baby....

[JustMyWords]

You have no clue, do you? All the things you list CAN be considered. No one is saying that the woman coming out of college with an associate's degree and no experience working part-time should be paid the same as a man with a master's degree and 40 years experience doing the same job - unless, of course, the man with the degree and the experience is highly over-qualified, and the woman working part-time is actually the measure.

[Warthog]

Bus drivers must meet more stringent safety requirements as they are directly responsible for peoples safety. A RN is not a doctor, and many RNs are male. Stop categorizing people.

I worked in emergency services for nearly 40 years. I served under a female fire chief. I worked side by side female fire fighters, paramedics and police officers. Given my personal choice, I would rather work beside a man when it comes to heavy grunt labor, and along side a woman when it comes to methodical careful planning. From observation, females definitely tend to keep a cooler head under high pressure situations like red blanket accident extrications. But the thing is, we each have our own unique capabilities that should never be categorized by gender or anything else for that matter. Let all jobs be discriminated only by performance and track record of the individual.

[Charlestonian]

All who have opposed Equal Pay for Equal Work in the past have just been shooting themselves in the foot...cutting off their nose to spite their face. Who in their right mind wouldn't want their spouse/significant other to be able to earn and contribute more money to the family bank balance each payday? The good thing about the new law is that it is not going to discriminate: Those who oppose/d it are going to benefit from the new law anyway! If that doesn't make them happy, maybe they could donate the unwanted funds to the local food bank or spend it at the grocery or local mall to help stimulate the economy. Either way, it's a good thing.

[boycottrightwingthings]

I say hooray for the feminist agenda, us women have been getting screwed for a long time moneywise...and we are NOT enjoying it! As to your inane arguments, we are talking equal pay for equal work- what part of THAT don't you understand??

[littlepitcher]

And--in the call center, men got commissioned sales work, women got flat rate hourly.
Any further questions?

[macrophone]

How far can these directives go, really? Studies show that tall and/or goodlooking people make more money than their shorter/homelier counterparts. Should there be legislation to address this imbalance as well?

[prodemdss]

Do you really think they can legislate regarding such information? There are studies reflecting the forementioned information you stated, I have seen it, as well, but I can't imagine creating laws governing personal features, outside of sex, race, religion, color of skin, nationality, of course; how do you propose that? Or are you just against Obama's legislation. I say, it's a LONG time coming. Any progress is good progress, it can only become better and/ or more extensive.

[Car84]

What it really should boil down to is improper discrimination should be self-punishing. If you don't hire and keep happy qualfied women, minorities, disabled people, gays, left-handed red-heads, etc., you're only shooting yourself in the foot.

Smart employers should be the group that sees employees for their true worth to the organization - not the group that can do the best to meet the letter of the law.

[bayside]

Steve are you sure you are guy, you dont think like one..The empathy coming from you is very refreshing..