Laws / Regulations
How government laws are protecting women from wage discrimination
The Equal Pay Act (EPA)
One of the first laws to protect women from wage discrimination was The Federal Equal Pay Act of 1963. The Equal Pay Act (EPA) requires employers to pay men and women equally for doing the same work often referred to as “equal pay for equal work.” The Equal Pay Act protects women from sex discrimination in pay rates. It was passed to help correct the gender pay gap.
The EPA has not solved the gender pay gap. There has been some progression.
When the EPA was enacted, women earned 59 cents on the dollar compared to men. The pay gap has closed by just over 20 cents in the last 50 years.
The EPA has not been proven to be an effective law because there are loopholes that can be used by employers (5).
The Civil Rights Act of 1964
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 called for an equal opportunity in the workplace. The law prohibited employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, or sex. (6) The Law required every U.S. company with more than 100 employees to give an annual report to the government.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) was created to collect employment data. (7) The EEOC is an independent federal agency that acts as a watchdog by keeping a close eye on companies' hiring practices.
The main purpose of the EEOC was to collect an Employer Information Report (EEO-1) each year.
The report records the number of employees per job category broken down by race and sex.
Obama Executive Order 2016
In 2016, the Obama administration made an executive order to promote equal employment opportunity, diversity and inclusion in the federal workforce.
Change to annual EEO-1 report:
A new section added to the report shows the salary of employees per job category broken down by race and sex.
The new section called the Component 2 Pay Data provision.
For the first time the EEOC will have data showing the difference between what men and women are being paid for the same job (8).
Trump suspends new Pay Data requirement
In 2017, President Trump suspended the Component 2 Pay Data provision of the EEO-1 report. Again companies are not required to report any information about employee pay based on gender.
The National Women's Law Center (NWLC) challenged the Trump administration's suspension on the Pay Data provision. On March 4, 2019, a federal judge in D.C. lifted the suspension and ordered the immediate reinstatement of the Pay Data collection provisions. September 30, 2019 is the deadline for companies to provide EEOC with Component 2 Pay Data for 2017 and 2018. (8).
Freedom of Information Act
A FOIA was submitted to to the EEOC to find out the percentage of required companies that have submitted their EEO-1 Component 2 -pay data reports for 2017 and 2018 by the due date of September 30, 2019.
Response
The EEOC responded to the FOIA request October 29, 2019. The response stated that as of September 25, 2019, only 39.7% of eligible filers have completed submission of Component 2 EEO-1 data.