Rosa DeLauro

The USDA is responsible for egg safety at processing plants, not the FDA, which is leading the inspection. This split jurisdiction created a disjointed inspection process.

This outbreak could have been prevented.

I believe they do, and I think we ought to deal with resources that get us to where we want to go.

We need to stop and ask why a parking meter reader is worth less than an electrical meter reader.

Women earn only 77 cents for every dollar earned by men.

The gender pay gap is not just a women's issue. It is a family issue that affects the millions of young, old, and middle-aged Americans who rely on a woman breadwinner or co-breadwinner for their family.

For every dollar a man earns, women earn only 77 cents.

Women lose an average of $434,000 in income over a lifetime due to the gender pay gap.

As long as there are unfair disparities in pay, it is always the right time to talk about pay equity.

Congresswoman DeLauro talked about women over the age of 70 are the poorest sector of our society.

Making sure that every woman earns a fair day's pay is increasingly important to family economic well-being.

Put simply, the Paycheck Fairness Act is a modest, common-sense reform that closes numerous longstanding loopholes in the Equal Pay Act.

I am so proud that the first law President Obama signed was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.

But as significant an achievement as that law was, we still need to act to eliminate that pay discrimination.

I believe the goal of this committee should be to find solutions, and I have two solutions to offer for this potential problem.

Congress has put two laws on the books to combat such discrimination--Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Equal Pay Act of 1963.

Unfortunately, pay discrimination is a harsh reality in today's workplace, but it doesn't have to be that way.

I welcome this opportunity to argue in favor of equal pay for women in the workforce as a proven means to strengthen American families and to grow our middle class.

I am confident that there is no member of this committee who would tolerate paying a woman less for the same work simply because she is a woman.

I want to thank my colleague Senator Dodd publicly, as I have privately, for his great leadership in this area for so many, many years.

I am pleased and proud that the first piece of legislation that President Obama signed into law was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, but that was only the first step.

I believe that Paycheck Fairness is legislation whose time has come.

I believe that paycheck fairness is legislation whose time has come.

He has spent so much of his professional career in trying to ensure the economic security of women and families in this Nation.

I believe we have a moral obligation to ensure that one half of the American workforce is treated as fairly and equitably as the other half.