Pay equality
Posted by Lizzie on Sep-5-2008There’s a lot of talk about women’s issues this election cycle. Thanks to Hillary Clinton, and now Sarah Palin, we’re back in the spotlight. In that vein, Congress is pressing for a revote on the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which failed to pass previously. McCain has come out again it:
“I am all in favor of pay equity for women, but this kind of legislation, as is typical of what’s being proposed by my friends on the other side of the aisle, opens us up to lawsuits for all kinds of problems,” the expected GOP presidential nominee told reporters. “This is government playing a much, much greater role in the business of a private enterprise system.”
I’ve recently engaged in a half-hearted IT job search - in anticipation of my eventual graduation from the Tech program. There seems to be a little available, but I’ve heard that women are not treated favorably in the IT industry. It would please me, and thousands of other women, tremendously if this actually became law. Would I know that my male counterparts were making more than me? Probably not. But this act would give me recourse should I find out about a pay discrepancy after the fact. As a woman hoping to work in a male-dominated field, I would feel just a little better knowing I had a safety net.
There was some talk that this law isn’t necessary. I beg to differ. I worked with a company (unrelated to the tech field) that cut me a mystery check. When I inquired to what the purpose of the check was, I was told that it was to make up for a pay difference between me and my male counterparts. I had no idea that the men were making that much more per hour than I was, but there was a lawsuit and the settlement agreement was that this company would pay the hourly difference to each female for whatever period of time they agreed to (I think it was 3 months, even though I’d been there for over a year at that point). I left that company not long afterward, but my eyes had been opened. The reasoning for the lower pay was that women are mothers and so are prone to miss work because of their sick children. Men, on the other hand, are more reliable and should be rewarded. Really?
At a time when a major political party has nominated a self-proclaimed “hockey mom” to be vice president, there should be no more “she should get less because she’s a mom”. This woman is seeking a job while parenting 5 children (and potentially helping parent a grandchild) so the reason listed above would apply to her and her pay should be cut significantly. Right? No. Wrong. Her husband will be able to tend to the children while she runs for office and he can tend to the children while she continues to govern Alaska (except that he’s got a full-time job plus an extra job on the side in the summer, but that’s not this issue). It’s only fair that the rest of American women enjoy the same equality in pay as the women who govern them.
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Good read and it is funny how some people try to say they weren’t selling PR or SERPS when infact that’s all it was about. I can see how some people are pissed about Google cracking down but when you look longterm it might help keep the integrity of the searches, versus the highest bidder having his/her anchor text everywhere…the crackdown has been a bit harsh though
Hi, Matt, thanks for stopping by.
A few short months ago the same people that are so adamantly declaring they aren’t selling pagerank were actively promoting their blogs as “PR [insert high number]” as well as refusing to link to any blogs with a small number. There were numerous threads “Get a Link with a PR5 for FREE!” or something such as that. Others were actively selling links in their blogrolls because they knew that their PR was worth something. I remember being informed that PR 5 blogs, for example, shouldn’t link to me and who did I think I was? Bah!
Guess we’re all on the same page now, huh?
I do agree that Google went a little overboard with the slapdowns, but what more can you do? I’m just going to go back to doing my thing before I cared about PR.