For the St. Louis American
Former Massachusetts lieutenant governor Dr. Evelyn Murphy of Brandeis University’s Women’s Studies Research Center has written a book, Getting Even: Why Women Don’t Get Paid Like Men and What to do About It.
At a recent program at The Center of Clayton – Closing the Wage Gap: Who Pays for Unequal Pay? — panelists discussed why women generate significantly less wealth than men and how discrimination effects the entire society.
When Murphy entered the work force – she’s a baby boomer, so I imagine she’s in her late 50s – women earned 59 cents on the dollar. Now it’s 77 cents. “We thought we’d catch up (or the gap would close),” she said. “It’s the same as 10 years ago.”
Pay inequity has a big financial impact on women who don’t go to college. A woman high school graduate in her working life loses $700 thousand. But women college graduates also lose, $1.2 million and professional school graduates, such as law or medicine, $2 million.
The Equal Pay Act of 1963 requires that “men and women be given equal pay for equal work in the same establishment.” It’s illegal otherwise. Lawsuits can result from unfair and unequal treatment in the workplace; however, legal hurdles are tremendous and suits should be the last resort.
Pay gaps do not only occur among African Americans and Latino Americans. White women are also victimized. Women of color face even more intense discrimination and happen to be the most impoverished.
Roz Sherman Voellinger, labor education specialist at the University of Missouri Extension, acting as moderator, queried panelists about problems these women face. Yes, black women are paid as a whole lot less than black men. Black women only make 68 cents on the dollar; hence, more attention must be paid to the poverty and struggle of so many black women.
Georgia Donahue of the Community Action Agency said she’s “totally amazed how low-income women manage.” Averaging $1,200 monthly wages, ineligible for subsidized childcare, which can spiral up to $600 with only $600 left for expenses. “Women do it on less,” was the recurring theme.
Attorney Melvin D. Kennedy of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, a panelist, said closing pay gaps is more difficult in a pro-business environment.
Corporations are more focused on increasing shareholder wealth than diversity, although they want to protect themselves from lawsuits, said panelist Dr. Sherry Tucker, head of Tucker Consultants in St. Louis.
Panelist Suzanne Gellman, financial education specialist at University of Missouri Extension, said everyone loses with pay gaps: the family, children, the workforce and the economy. Also, elderly women, many living longer, are two times more likely to live below the poverty level.
By the same token, Murphy said women should “stop blaming” themselves and start organizing, engaging in grassroots social action. “It’s not going away unless we do something. We don’t want to pass this on to our daughters and granddaughters.”
To calculate unequal pay, go to: www.wageproject.com
Malaika Horne, Ph.D. is director of the Executive Leadership Institute in the College of Business Administration at UM – St. Louis.
