…Because We Are Women
Posted by Michelle Moquin on November 18th, 2010
Good morning. Well…let me think…is it really? Not for women. A republican-led filibuster killed the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill that would have lifted the cap on damages in pay- discrimination lawsuits and restricted how employers can fight such complaints. Women lose again. I guess women will still earn less simply because we are women.
Pay-Discrimination Bill Opposed by Business Fails in Senate Vote
A bill that would have made it easier for workers to sue their employers for pay discrimination was defeated in the U.S. Senate after business groups said the measure backed by the Obama administration was a jobs killer.
Senate Democrats didn’t muster enough votes today to overcome a Republican-led filibuster of the Paycheck Fairness Act, a bill that would have lifted the cap on damages in pay- discrimination lawsuits and restricted how employers can fight such complaints. The legislation would also have banned employers from penalizing workers who share salary information to find pay discrepancies.
Democrats pushed the measure, which would have strengthened remedies under the Equal Pay Act of 1963 for women, early in the Obama administration as part of a pro-labor agenda. It passed the House of Representatives in January 2009, along with the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.
The Lilly Ledbetter bill became the first law that Barack Obama signed as president. The measure, primarily intended to benefit women, lets workers pursue claims of being underpaid because of discrimination that occurred years earlier. A U.S. Supreme Court ruling in 2007 had disallowed such lawsuits.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers and other business groups lobbied Republican senators to block the companion piece of legislation.
The Democrats, needing 60 votes to end the filibuster, got 58. One Democrat, Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska, joined Republicans in voting against the legislation. Three Republican women who voted for the Lilly Ledbetter bill — Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, both of Maine, and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas — this time voted with their party.
‘Tough Vote’
“This was a tough vote for many due to the sound-bite appeal of the bill’s title, but in the end they did the right thing and voted for jobs,” Keith Smith, director of employment and labor policy at the manufacturers’ association, said in an e-mailed statement. “It is difficult to imagine a scenario in which this bill would not have led to lower wages and fewer jobs.”
The Business Roundtable and employer groups have cited the Obama administration’s support for the legislation as evidence of anti-business policies. The Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers this week sent letters to senators notifying them that the business groups would monitor their votes on the measure.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said Republicans who blocked the bill would rather “give tax breaks to CEOs who ship jobs overseas” than ensure that women are paid the same as men for doing equal work. Senator Barbara Mikulski, a Maryland Democrat, said the bill was “critical to our economic recovery.”
“We need to make sure the family budget is based on people getting paid for the work they do,” she said.
The Paycheck Fairness Act is S. 3772.
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Readers: What stupid women would vote to oppose women receiving equal pay? Uh..let me see… Republican Senators Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, Kay Bailey Hutchison. We only needed two more votes to end the filibuster. Basically these women screwed us over because they voted with their party. Remember these women – they are not girls girls.
I HOPE the day gets better…peace out.
Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.
Gratefully your blog host,
michelle
Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)
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November 18th, 2010 at 6:11 pm
Hmmm, how’s it critical to the economic recovery to have single parents i.e. women, struggling to be ‘breadwinners’ – or are only CEO’s adequate breadwinners? No wonder women actually buy into ‘finding a rich man to take care of them’ bc we can’t even get a law that just reserves us the right to earn same pay for same work, let alone feed children with it…
I remember having heated chats about this when I was single and men thinking bc they chose to have a wife and kids that they deserved more money (and ‘family time’ off) meanwhile I chose to be single and did not receive the same pay or same amount of ‘family time’ but I did sort the system and quickly figured out that talking got me nowhere but the math did, for some reason if I took 2 days off a month (family time or practicing at it : ) I actually earned more commissions bc of their dumb hour/sales calculations, stupid asses took almost a year to figure out my game, tee hee…even then they had to admit I had a point and basically looked the other way, did thay have a choice I think I might’ve casually said shall I call my attorney bc Art doesn’t mind answering questions for me anytime I call, hahaha, I saw the look on their faces (she has an attorney? Do we really want to go here, she could turn into a discrimation nightmare…and is it worth it, people like her, etc…)
Mikulski gets my bonk on the head award, and my sz 9 up her ass for good measure, too : )
Pluvness, Zen Lill
November 22nd, 2010 at 9:35 am
I have trouble following the directions of a flash light,
so I hope I did it right…Thanks for the help.