Equal Pay for Women

March 15, 2022 marks equal payday. According to the National Committee on Pay Equity, “This date symbolizes how far into the year women must work to earn what men earned in the previous year.” Recently I have been reading and researching, and it turns out the situation hasn’t really improved. Women still get paid less, especially women of color. A report from the US Census Bureau says women make on average, only 83 cents for every dollar men earn. An example will be if a male makes $100, a female will only make $83, and they are doing the same job. Over half a century pay discrimination became illegal in the United States, a tenacious pay gap between men and women continues to hurt our nation’s workers and our national economy. The pay gap even continues as women retire!

As a result of lower lifetime earnings, they receive less in Social Security and pensions. In terms of overall retirement income, women have only 70% of what men do. Equal Pay Day was created by the National Committee on Pay Equity (NCPE) in 1996 as a shared awareness event to show the gap between men’s and women’s wages. It was initially called ‘National Pay Inequity Awareness Day’ and switched to Equal Pay Day in 1998: “Equal Pay Day was originated by the National Committee on Pay Equity (NCPE) in 1996 as a public awareness event to illustrate the gap between men’s and women’s wages. NCPE leadership decided years ago to select a Tuesday in April as Equal Pay Day. Tuesday was selected to illustrate how distant into the next work week women must work to earn what men earned the prior weeks. The date also is selected to avoid religious holidays and other significant events: “Because women earn less, on average than men, they must work longer for the same amount of pay. The wage gap is even greater for most women of color.”

Here is what some leaders and major CEOs had to say about this situation (These responses have been edited by CNN for clarity and length) :

Janet Yellen
US Secretary of the Treasury

“Research has shown that although women now enter professional schools at rates nearly equal to men, they are still substantially less likely to reach the highest echelons of their professions… One of the contributing factors to this disparity is that top jobs in fields such as law and business require longer workweeks and penalize individuals with caretaking responsibilities.”

Rosalind (Roz) Brewer
CEO of Walgreens Boots Alliance

“Years ago, I was offered a fraction of what a male predecessor was making (and I knew such because his compensation was disclosed publicly as an officer of the company). I pushed back and negotiated more equitable pay for myself…I share this story intentionally with women I trust, so they know others have experienced inequity, fought for equal or fair pay, and received it.”

I hope this article helped inform you about the unfair pay woman have.