So I will celebrate by doing so. The Paycheck Fairness Act is a good thing. It would allow women who are discriminated against under the Equal Pay Act to get punitive damages. This is a good thing, IMHO, since it sometimes seems like punitive damages are the only thing that corporations will listen to. Further, it makes it illegal to fire somebody for discussing their salary.
It's a pretty modest expansion of the law, and in directions that I think are reasonable.
It has already passed in the house. If you'd like to bother your senator about it, here's a canned letter that looks pretty good, or you can just contact your senator directly, which is usually more effective.
CC
2 comments:
To me, this is the most important part: "Further, it makes it illegal to fire somebody for discussing their salary." I've been in the workforce for 38 years. In that time, I've worked for companies where discussing salary was a firing offense, for companies where it was merely discouraged, for the government where salaries were public record, and companies where earnings were posted on the wall as incentive. In every instance, without exception, the amount of sexism, favoritism, nepotism, and every other ism was exactly proportional to the level of secrecy. The Victorian distaste for discussing something so crass as money made all forms of workplace discrimination possible, in my opinion.
Joel -- right on!
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