GOP is wrong to deny women equal pay


In 2013, the U.S. Census Bureau revealed that the average woman earns 78 percent of what a man makes despite working a similar full-time job, and Senate Republicans simply don’t care.

Andrea Wijaya | Daily Trojan

Andrea Wijaya | Daily Trojan

 

On Monday, Republican Senators unanimously rejected the Paycheck Fairness Act, a piece of legislation that attempts to fix the gap between money women and men make for the same amount of effort and time on the job.

It is the third time Republicans have rejected the law in two years. The only people in this country who deserve less pay — if any at all — for equal amounts of work are politicians who consider it their “work” to systematically endorse the oppression of women. For the rest of America, it is time to end the vicious gender discrimination that has plagued this country for 200 years too long.

The Paycheck Fairness Act includes several amendments to the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act that include, according to Politico, “offering training for salary negotiations, increasing employees’ legal options for fighting pay disparities and prohibiting retaliation against employees seeking salary information.” According to the legislative summary, the bill also — heaven forbid — “makes employers who violate sex discrimination prohibitions liable in a civil action for either compensatory or (except for the federal government) punitive damages.”

Without these important protections, it is no wonder that the pay gap hasn’t closed at all since 2007. It is also a shame.

One objection, advanced by Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) (who voted against the bill) is that the bill could potentially outlaw merit-based pay, which rewards employees based on individual performance. But that objection is unfounded — if an employer’s idea of merit pay is one that rewards men more than it rewards women, that isn’t merit pay — it’s gender discrimination. If an employer’s idea of merit pay is one that rewards men and women equally for good performance, the Paycheck Fairness Act would have no problem with it.

Some Republicans preferred to direct the issue to something different entirely.

“It’s politics,” said Sen. Deb Fischer (R-NE), another Republican woman who didn’t vote for the bill. “It’s a one-sided vote for political reasons, so [Democrats] can use it in campaigns.”

That’s a C+ argument. Sure, it’s midterm season, but here is the awkward moment when Republicans need to be reminded that this is the third time they’ve rejected the bill in two years. Last April, when there was nigh an election in sight, Republicans didn’t even allow the bill to be debated. This time, they allowed the bill to come to the floor for debate before rejecting it — but only because the vote prevented the minimum wage bill and other progressive pieces of legislation from being debated. In fact, Republicans are so shortsighted in this case that they don’t even realize that just voting for the bill in bipartisan fashion would only have a negligible political influence on the midterms because both parties could take credit for it.

Republicans also tried to wish away the issue by invoking the “small business” excuse, an old standby.

“I think this bill would result in excessive litigation that would impose a real burden, particularly on small businesses,” said Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), who also didn’t vote for the bill. “I think existing laws are adequate,” Collins told the Huffington Post.

Arguments like this are the reason most conservative Americans are afraid to sneeze for fear of disturbing the sacred institution of “small businesses.” Granted, some regulation is good regulation. Laws that allow someone to sue an employer if the roof falls on top of them at work also impose a “burden” on small businesses: they have to build roofs that won’t collapse on their workers. Laws that burden small businesses with the task of paying their women workers the same as their men workers are justifiable burdens indeed.

The Paycheck Fairness Act is a particular piece of politics that is too important to be left to politicians. While women are working equal time for less pay this fall, Congress will be on recess campaigning. Unfortunately, Republicans will be campaigning without the support of half of the electorate.

 

Nathaniel Haas is a junior majoring in political science and economics. His column, “State of the Union,” runs Fridays. 

 

3 replies
  1. Let's Tell The Truth on Prop 1
    Let's Tell The Truth on Prop 1 says:

    Research the “Equal Pay Act of 1963”. It’s very first clause mandates equal pay by gender. So why a redundant re-run? Because the so called “paycheck fairness act” has two key elements: 1) it provides political fodder to push a bogus ‘war on women’ and 2) it rewards the trial lawyers who are in bed with the Democrats.

    Read the Equal Pay Act and learn the truth on this time wasting political theatre.

  2. Chris Fennell
    Chris Fennell says:

    Nathaniel, I enjoyed the article but perhaps i can share that the bill was broader than just the pay equality for women, it also had a clause that would protect employees who shared salary information from punishment. My problem with that clause is that employees should not be share salary information as it can create a culture of jealousy envy, and strife. Having worked for a fortune 500 company and in Higher education i can attest to the problems public salary information can cause. While I agree something should be done to better align women’s salary rights with men’s I believe there are better ways to legislate this and this bill was (probably) not one of them. For the sake of clarity, I know one (albeit old) argument that was used as justification was that companies would assign a financial value to maternity leave. Having a maternity package + salary would equate to equal pay. The obvious problem with this view is that not all women take or use maternity leave and therefore is actually a fringe benefit that results in a lower overall pay for women. I want to be clear that i dont agree with that argument but from an HR/Payroll perspective i see how they rationalized it. I’ve also seen (glanced over) the other iterations of this bill and neither to me is sufficient. I understand that this is an opinion piece but i believe saying the “GOP is wrong to deny women equal pay” is a bit unfair dont you think?

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