Today is Equal Pay Day

Today is Equal Pay Day, symbolizing how far into the year women have to work to earn what men earned the previous year. So, simply, today, women have to work 15 1/2 months to earn what men earn in 12 months.

Equal Pay Day was started in 1996 by the National Committee on Pay Equity. At that time, women earned 73.8 cents for every dollar men earned. This statistic was (and is) based on Census figures of the median wages of all full-time, year-round workers. While we’ve come a long way, baby, (and many may reasonably argue that women’s rights are being challenged daily in this country, in a way we’ve not seen in years) equal pay is still a goal. Today, women earn 77.4 cents on every dollar men earn. That’s hardly a gain.

Census data indicate that women fare better in some states than in others, at least as far as the wage gap is concerned. While women’s earnings lag behind men’s in all 50 states, women who live in Washington, D.C. have the most pay parity, earning 91.4 cents to a man’s dollar. Women in Wyoming, the state with the largest wage gap, earn only 63.8 percent of men’s earnings.

Women across the country are showing their dissatisfaction with the wage gap by wearing red to symbolize how far “in the red” they are when it comes to their pay.

Another way to take action is to contact your Congressional representatives and ask them to support the Paycheck Fairness Act.

The National Committee on Pay Equity has an entire website devoted to this subject. It was founded in 1979 to eliminate sex and race based wage discrimination and to achieve pay equity. Visit them for more information and for links to congressional representatives. Here’s the link to their site: http://www.pay-equity.org/index.html