Update: This segment prompted criticism from Terri Kelly's former employer, Novartis Vaccines and Diagnostics Novartis. They sent us this statement.
According to the Institute for Women's Policy Research, American women continue to earn approximately 80 cents on every dollar their male counterparts make. The reason for this disparity is often debated: Is it simply gender discrimination? Do fewer women negotiate their salaries? Whatever the explanation, Senate Democrats believe they have a solution: the Paycheck Fairness Act.
Congress is set to debate the Act this week, and the measure would compel employers to prove that pay disparities between male and female workers are related to job performance, not gender. The Act would also protect employees from retaliation if they share their salary information. An Institute for Women's Policy Research study finds that 19 percent of workers in small firms (less than 100 people) and 23 percent of workers in large firms are contractually barred from discussing their wages, but a much higher percentage of workers report that their firms "discourage" discussion of salary. Irin Carmon, staff writer at Salon, argues that the best way to combat the gender pay gap is for workers to share their salary information.
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Comments [4]
Feminists need to know that some men earn more than other men in the same work.
Re: Paycheck Fairness Act.
It will fail because it's based on a lie: women make 77 cents to men's dollar for the same work.
The statistic does NOT mean women are paid less than men in the same jobs. Nor does it mean, even more incredibly in the vein of “men are stronger than women” (which means to many that every man is stronger than every woman), that every woman earns 23% less than every man, perhaps leading some of the more benighted and the blinkered ideological to believe Diane Sawyer of ABC News earns less than the young man walking back and forth on the street wearing a “Pizzas $5” sign.
The figures are arrived at by comparing the sexes' median incomes: women's median is 77 percent of men's. In 2009, the median income of full-time, year-round workers was $47,127 for men, compared to $36,278 for women or 77 percent of men's median. http://www.catalyst.org/publication/217/womens-earnings-and-income
Median means 50% of workers earn above the figures and 50% below. That means that a lot of female workers in the higher ranges of women's median make more money than a lot of male workers in the lower ranges of men's median.
“Women's 77 cents to men's dollar” doesn't account for the number of hours worked each week, experience, seniority, training, education or even the job description itself. It compares all women to all men, not people in the same job with the same experience. So the salary of a 60-year-old male computer engineer with 30 years at his company is weighed against that of a young first-year female teacher. Also, men are much more likely than women to work two jobs; hence, more often than women, a man earning $50,000 from his two jobs is weighed against a women earning $25,000 from her one job, so that he appears to be unfairly earning twice as much as she.
For much more, see "Will the Ledbetter Act Help Women?" at http://malemattersusa.wordpress.com/2011/12/03/will-the-ledbetter-fair-pay-act-help-women/
The National Labor Relations Act protects the rights of employees to speak with each other regarding wages, benefits and other working conditions. If you have any questions about these rights, please go to NLRB.gov to read more, and find out how to contact a local office of the National Labor Relations Board.
Staff are contractually prohibited from disclosing salary with others where I work. Some will discuss raises which is also prohibited, but I have not disclosed or heard others disclose base salary.
It's not only about discrimination. In our small company, people tend to find out what others make. Last year, significant differences in pay, combined with some other issues, led to resignation of two of our most valuable senior staff. My rule is, if you're responsible for peoples' compensation, you better be ready to convincingly explain why people are paid what they're paid.
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