Paying Black women what they deserve
Today marks “Black Women’s Equal Pay Day,” the day in the new year when Black women earn the same amount as their white male counterparts did for the previous year — a whole seven months later. In other words, Black women have to work a full year and then another 215 days to make what white men make in just 12 months.
This ingrained economic injustice cannot continue.
As we try to move forward together from the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s also important to remember that Black people have been twice as likely to die from COVID-19 as white people. Black women are disproportionately represented in essential and front-line occupations; many have had to continue going to work throughout this pandemic, risking their health and that of their families and setting back their career prospects while others were able to work from home.
It’s not enough to say “Black Lives Matter” or to praise essential workers, even holding them a parade. If we’re going to make real progress, we need to start giving women and New Yorkers of color equal pay for equal work, period.
New York City government can lead the way by putting its money where its mouth is on three key pay equity issues.
First, we need pay parity for our FDNY Emergency Medical Services workers, who are far more likely to be women of color than their higher-paid firefighter counterparts. Our emergency medical technicians and paramedics have tirelessly and courageously saved lives since the start of the pandemic. Yet they are the lowest-paid first responders in New York City, with a starting salary of $32,520 compared to $42,500 for NYPD officers, $46,261 for correction officers, and $45,196 for FDNY firefighters. After five years, an EMS officer can expect to earn $50,604, compared to about $85,000 for police and correction officers and $110,000 for firefighters.
Second, we need to take action on racial and gender pay disparity across city government. In the City Council, I co-sponsored Local Law 18, which passed in 2019 and requires the city to publish statistics on city workers’ salaries and disparities by race and gender. Knowledge is power, so this law is a significant step forward. The first report released yesterday showed the median salary for men is $21,600 higher than women, and that white employee’s salaries are $27,800 higher for black employees and $22,200 higher than Latino employees.
That doesn’t necessarily mean that Black and white workers in identical jobs are paid different amounts. But it may well mean that Black public employees are much likelier to be in lower-paid positions, quite possibly for reasons that have something to do with ingrained bias.
It’s good that we know the facts, but that’s not enough by a long shot. Now that we have proof of such glaring gaps, Mayor de Blasio (and likely Mayor Adams starting in 2022) need to find ways to address them — from reducing the role of bias in hiring, to creating pipeline programs for Black women workers to rise to higher-paying leadership positions.
Third, we need better pay and treatment for the government-contracted human service workers who staff homeless shelters, food banks, senior centers and other frontline organizations. These workers are 82% women and 80% people of color, and years of underfunding have left many of these sheroes living at or below the poverty line. The city took a step forward in this year’s adopted budget, which includes $24 million for a onetime pay bonus for human service workers. But once again, we need to do more for these women of color, including negotiating contracts that pay higher wages and include regular cost-of-living adjustments.
Of course, pay disparity is not limited to government and government-contracted workers. We must push pay parity in the private sector as well, including by requiring large businesses to conduct pay equity audits. We must select and elect more women of color for leadership positions, where they can bring their lived experience and voice to this issue, from the Community Board to borough president to mayor. We must push for living-wage jobs, and for family and medical leave policies that help women stay in the workforce and move up the career ladder.
But our city government workforce is a place to start. Let’s clean up our own house, and lead by the power of our example. Let’s show that being progressive isn’t just about slogans, but improving quality of life for the least powerful among us. Let’s move forward together, and do our part to make Black Women’s Equal Pay Day a relic of the past.