On the recordApril 20, 2010
Today Americans are observing Equal Pay Day. It is the date that marks the 110 extra days that women must work into 2010 in order to equal what men earned in 2009. In 1963, responding to the fact that the 25 million female workers in our workforce earned just 60 percent of the average pay for men, Congress enacted the Equal Pay Act to end this brazen yet widely tolerated discrimination. Over the past 47 years, we have made progress towards the great goal of equal pay for women. But, progress has been stalled in the last decade. As we observe Equal Pay Day this year, it is a sad fact that too many women in this country still do not get paid what men do for the exact same work. On average, a woman makes only 77 cents for every dollar that a man makes. The circumstances are even worse for Latinas and women of color. This is wrong and unjust. But, even more, it threatens the economic security of our families. Millions of Americans are dependent on a woman's paycheck just to get by, put food on the table, pay for child care, and deal with rising health care bills. Two-thirds of mothers bring home at least a quarter of their family's earnings. In many families, the woman is the sole breadwinner.
