House Passes Paycheck Fairness Act
Feature Story by Tyler Lewis - 8/5/2008
The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill (247-178) on July 31 that will strengthen enforcement and remedies for pay discrimination.
The Paycheck Fairness Act will amend and improve the Equal Pay Act of 1963, which prohibits employers from paying men and women differently if they perform substantially equal work.
The Act will prohibit employers from retaliating against workers who ask about or discuss pay rates and wage practices, as well as require the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to improve its data collection on pay information. It will also ensure that women can obtain the same remedies for sex-based pay discrimination as those awarded to individuals who suffer
discrimination based on race and national origin
In addition, if an employee alleges pay discrimination, the employer will be required to prove that gaps in wages between men and women are genuinely the result of factors other than gender.
The House passage of the bill was hailed by civil rights groups. "This bill is the next essential step in the fight for fair pay. It carefully balances protections for both employees and employers, and closes gaps that have led to a narrow, constrained reading of the law, hampering its effectiveness," said Debra L. Ness, president of the National Partnership for Women & Families.
Civil rights groups say that the bill is important because women make, on average, 77 cents for every dollar that men make. According to the Department of Labor, women make up 46 percent of the U.S. workforce.
"Forty-five years after passage of the Equal Pay Act, it is shocking, and totally unacceptable, that women continue to be paid substantially less than men doing the same jobs," said Marcia Greenberger, co-president of the National Women's Law Center, in a statement.
In a July 24 letter to the House, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights pointed out the importance of women's wages in American families: "Unequal pay affects the economic security of women and the families who rely heavily on women's income, and worsens the precarious financial situation facing working families in the recent economic downturn."
Civil rights groups are urging the Senate to vote on the bill by the end of the year.
