Women Deserve Equal Pay

For full-time, year-round workers, women are paid on average only about 77% of what men are paid; for women of color, the gap is even wider. These wage gaps stubbornly remain despite the passage of the Equal Pay Act more than 40 years ago, and a variety of legislation prohibiting employment discrimination.

Women are still not receiving equal pay for equal work, let alone equal pay for work of equal value. This disparity not only affects women's spending power; it penalizes their retirement security by creating gaps in social security and pensions.

Facts about pay equity | What you can do

Facts About Pay Equity

• In 2005, women's median annual earnings were only $.77 for every $1.00 earned by men. For women of color, the gap is even worse – only $.71 for African American women and $.58 for Latinas.
  
• The General Accounting Office compiled data from the Current Population Survey regarding the ten industries that employ 71 percent of U.S. women workers and 73 percent of U.S. women managers. In seven of the ten industries examined, the pay gap between full-time male and female managers widened between 1995 and 2000.
  
• If women received the same wages as men who work the same number of hours, have the same education and union status, are the same age, and live in the same region of the country, then these women's annual income would rise by $4,000 and poverty rates would be cut in half. Working families would gain an astounding $200 billion in family income annually.
  
• Pay equity in female-dominated jobs (jobs in which women comprise 70 percent or more of the workforce) would increase wages for women by approximately 18 percent.
  
• Fifty-five percent of all women work in female-dominated jobs (jobs in which women comprise 70 percent or more of the workforce) whereas only 8.5 percent of all men work in these occupations. However, the men working in female-dominated jobs still receive about 20 percent more than women who work in female-dominated jobs.
  
• Women are paid less in every occupational classification for which sufficient information is available, according to the data analysis in over 300 job classifications provided by the U.S. Department of Labor Statistics.
  
• In 1963, the year of the Equal Pay Act's passage, full-time working women were paid 59 cents on average to the dollar received by men, while in 2005 women were paid 77 cents for every dollar received by men. In other words, for the last 42 years, the wage gap has only narrowed by less than half of a penny per year.

What You Can Do

1. Send a message to your legislators asking them to cosponsor the Paycheck Fairness Act. The bill, S. 766 in the Senate and H.R. 1338 in the House, aims to reduce the pay gap in several ways. It would enhance the enforcement of requirements of the Equal Pay Act and require a stronger commitment from the Department of Labor in its responsibilities to women workers. It provides for training programs for the employees of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs – the very people who deal with matters involving discrimination in the payment of wages. The bill also requires that the EEOC figure out a way to gather more comprehensive and useful data from employers without imposing additional reporting and paperwork requirements – data that can be used in the enforcement of federal laws prohibiting pay discrimination. Finally, the bill prohibits employers from punishing employees who share salary information with co-workers.
   
2. Wear red on Equal Pay Day, April 22, 2008. If we're going to be "in the red," we might as well wear it proudly to show our determination to end the wage gap.
   
3. Host an "Un-happy hour" on April 22 to signal our dissatisfaction with the wage gap. See if a local bar, club, or restaurant (try the women owned ones first!) will give you drink specials for the night: ideas include Dollar Drinks for 77 Cents or women pay 77% of their tabs and men pay 100%. Use this social time to network and plan local activities that can lead to improved wages for women and economic health for their families.
   
4. Attend a local rally or plan one. Check with local groups in your area to see if anyone is planning a rally (the participating organizations of the National Committee on Pay Equity is a good place to look for groups). Take your NOW rounds or homemade signs, fact sheets, alerts and determination…and feel free to wear red.
   
5. Start a wage club. This is something we can do every day of the year, not just on Equal Pay Day. The idea is that groups of 5 to 20 women meet in homes, community centers, coffee shops, and churches to discuss steps they can take to close the wage gap. Learn more.
   
6. Learn more about the wage gap. Here are some additional resources on pay equity:
   • American Association of University Women’s Information on Pay Equity
   • Institute for Women’s Policy Research: The Gender Wage Ratio: Women’s and Men’s Earnings Fact Sheet (PDF)
   • Business and Professional Women: Fact Sheet on Pay Equity
   • National Women's Law Center analysis of Paycheck Fairness Act (PDF)
   • National Committee on Pay Equity

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Sources:
U.S. Census Bureau, Income, Earnings and Poverty Data from the 2005 American Community Survey.
AFL-CIO & the Institute for Women's Policy Research, Equal Pay for Working Families: National and State Data on Pay Gap and Its Costs (1999).
A New Look Through the Glass Ceiling: Where are the Women? Commissioned by Representatives John D. Dingell (D-Mich.) and Carolyn B. Maloney (D-N.Y.) (2002). Posted 4/16/07