Unequal pay for women hurts us all

National “Equal Pay” Day is Tuesday, March 12, two days earlier than last year. Women on average are paid 84 cents for every $1 men make, 71 more days of work to earn what men earn in 12 months. That statistic is for white women without children with similar qualifications and job responsibilities to their male counterparts.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics determines several Equal Pay Days based on prior year data. The situation is actually much worse. White mothers must work until June to earn as much as men earn in a year. The pay gap is even wider for women of color. Black women must work until August to earn as much as men do in a year; for Native women, it’s September; for Latinas, it’s October.

These other Equal Pay Days receive little news coverage, and almost no attention is given to the long-term detrimental effects pay inequality has on women’s economic security and well-being. Not only do women have to work months longer to earn what men earn in a year, they often work more hours each week and more years in order to meet present and future expenses.

These pay gaps add up to thousands to millions of dollars of lost income over a lifetime. Women often have to cut back on their own employment to provide caregiving to elderly relatives as well as their children. The consequences of having less to live on during their working years and in retirement are most obvious later in life. Women generally live longer than men, causing more elderly women to live in poverty (tinyurl.com/mr2mzy6e). It has been 60 years since the Equal Pay Act of 1963 was signed. With the exception of the 2009 Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, Congress has failed to pass legislation to address these inequities. The Paycheck Fairness Act has been reintroduced in each Congress since the 1990s.

New Mexico Reps. Teresa Leger Fernández, Melanie Stansbury and Gabe Vasquez are among the co-sponsors of House Resolution 7 in the 118th Congress. Despite their efforts, the legislation has not moved since last March. Given the dysfunctional House leadership, even critically important budget bills are stalled. Sens. Martin Heinrich and Ben Ray Luján are co-sponsors of the mirror bill, S. 728, which is also fated to die.

Our next Congress needs to pass this legislation in order to revise the Fair Labor Standards Act, which prohibits wage discrimination on the basis of sex. The U.S. Department of Labor can then educate the public, compile data, expose gender pay disparities and impose penalties for noncompliance.

In order to guarantee fair workplaces and gender equity in other arenas, Congress must also vote to compile the fully ratified Equal Rights Amendment into the Constitution. Voters need to elect legislators who support women’s equality and economic security. Demographers predict a tsunami effect on our economy by 2030 because of our aging population. Longstanding disparities in gender equity will affect all of us.

New Mexico has its challenges for sure, but we can be an example for other states in respecting women. In 1972, voters approved the New Mexico Equal Rights Amendment, which states, “Equality of rights under law shall not be denied on account of the sex of any person.”

In 2013, New Mexico also passed the Fair Pay for Women Act requiring pay equity for state and private employees, but it does not apply to the approximately 25,000 federal employees working in New Mexico.

Next legislative session, New Mexico needs to pass the Paid Family Medical Leave Act, an insurance policy with strict guardrails that will provide safety nets for new mothers, caregivers of elders in crisis and other serious situations.

Meredith Machen, AAUW-NM public policy chair, lives in Santa Fe. Robbie Richards is AAUW-Santa Fe co-president.