On Monday, I told you guys about how the wage gap between men and women has greatly decreased, over the years. Now, I want to clarify these things up for you. Statistics have shown that yes, the wage gaps between the salaries of men and women has greatly decreased, but the gap is still quite big. This means that women have been getting paid more and more, over time, for the hard work that they have been doing. To clarify this; women have been entering into more of the professional job areas. More and more women have been employed as physicians, lawyers, and managers of various businesses. This might not sound like much, but in the Women's point of view, it is a huge success. Before, the sexism upon women prevented them from entering the working world as professional job holders, and even made them earn less money than what men made. Even though this still happens today, many acts such as the Paycheck Fairness Act, and the very early, Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 both helped women overcome this sexism, and enter into the world as professional job holders. The Fair Labor Standards Act, which helped make minimum wages possible, did not help protect women against discrimination. But, in 1963, the Equal Pay Act, or EPA, was introduced, and passed by JFK. This act ammends the FLS Act of 1938, and makes it illegal for companies to discriminate against their employees, which is based on the sex of their employees. It also states that the Employers must make all pays equal (for both men and women), and treat all women and men equally, and make sure that this environment stays friendly, and has no discrimination. A then, later ammendment in 2007 was passed through the senate after a second try, further strengthening these rules because many companies did not really abide by this law. The Paycheck Fairness Act is basically one of the latest ammendments to the EPA. This was brought up on November 17, 2010. It was proposing to help the victims (mainly women) of wage-paying discrimination and sexism. It also helped them get fair amounts of wages, compared to what others were making in that certain field of work. This bill was shot down in the senate, in a 58-41 decision. This act would have also required employers to pay employees who were covered under this law about 1.5 times the regular rate of pay.
Clarifying Questions Asked:
Are there any Acts that benefitted only women?
Yes, as I stated above, the Equal Pays Act helped women through protecting them from discrimination; both in the work place, and in their salaries.
Does discrimination REALLY happen to these women?
Yes, from many accounts and experiences, women have been discriminated for all of time. You can see that in these workplaces, these women are still making about 200 dollars less than what men make. Salaries are not the only thing that women are discriminated against for; there is still sexual harassment, and many other forms of discrimination, sexism, and harassment in all workplaces.
Why would women work in the labor fields?
If you look at the economy now, obviously any one would want any job they could find. In my speech for this current event, I might have made it seem that all women wanted to work in labor fields. Well, I did not mean it to happen that way. What I wanted to prove was to show you guys a comparison between men and women. How men would be getting fired (mainly the ones in labor fields and such) and how women would be getting hired as professional job holders. If you think there are no women working in jobs such as construction and such, you are completely wrong. There are plenty of women contracters, builders, designers, and plain-old construction workers who pave roads and such.
Link to the Article's website:
http://www.usatoday.com/money/workplace/2010-09-13-wage-gaps_N.htm
Probing Question:
Seeing the current wage gap, what other policies aside from the ones that have already been introduced do you think the government should put out to help this problem? If you think no other policy should be put in place, please explain why.
i think that the government should start awareness for the issue. it is tough to further enforce laws that help this cause because there have been acts that have helped women get equal rights in the work place. i think there should only be awareness. women should get payed the same amount of money for the same job as a man.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the government should spread more awareness of this problem. This should be a well known issue until it is fixed, because should not be discriminated against based only by their sex, especially for something as concerning as this. If women do not get paid as much as men, the could have trouble paying for their house, family, food, etc, and this is not okay. I think that the government should use any policies necessary to raise awareness of this awful problem working women have to deal with.
ReplyDeleteWith the wage gap, I do not really see this as much of a problem. I think the issue lacks a great deal of evidence. I believe the core of the problem is that men do more laborious jobs, which entail higher pay. Women do not want to pour cement and mix concrete all day, however; men will. More and more women now-a-days are going to college and receiving higher paying jobs. I believe that people are speaking to soon and are not allowing enough time between the change in generations. The prior generations were stay at home moms and homemakers. Our generations are single parents who work multiple jobs. Overtime, I think the wage-gap between men and women will equal out.
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