Tom Harkin: “on January 29, 2009, President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. It was a proud day and I was there for…”

“on January 29, 2009, President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. It was a proud day and I was there for that. A critical law, the first legislation signed into law by President Obama after his first election, reversed the outrageous Supreme Court decision in Ledbetter v Goodyear and made clear that a worker such as Lilly Ledbetter, who does not learn of her pay inequities for years, still had recourse to challenge her wage discrimination. Today we celebrate the anniversary of the enactment of this important law, but at the same time we must recognize it was only a first step. We need to do much more to ensure that all workers in our society are paid fairly for their work and are not shortchanged because of the their gender, race or other personal characteristic. That is why, 4 years after enactment of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, I am proud to introduce once again the Fair Pay Act, a bill I have introduced in every Congress since 1996. Let me give some background. In 1963, Congress enacted the Equal Pay Act to end unfair discrimination against women in the workplace. At that time, 25 million female workers earned just 60 percent of the average pay for men. While we have made progress toward the goal of true pay equity fully a half century later, too many women still do not get paid what men do for the same or nearly the same work. Let's be clear about this. The Equal Pay Act of 1963 has to do with women doing the same jobs as men.…”