January 8, 2009: Support the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act
When our beloved mother, Anastasia, began work back in themiddle of the last century as a counter waitress at a place calledLiberty Lunch on Broadway in Toledo, Ohio, she did not even earn theminimum wage. And I will tell you what; she deserved it. That wage wasonly made possible by the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938. But evenwhen that act passed, her vile boss would then cash her check anddeduct the increase from her and pocket the money for himself. Sadly,stories of pay discrimination and inequity still reside across ourcountry.
The Lilly Ledbetter bill is named after Lilly Ledbetter,who worked for almost 20 years at a Goodyear Tire and Rubber Companyplant in Gadsden, Alabama. After finding out that she was the lowestpaid supervisor at the plant where she worked, despite the fact thatshe had more experience than her male counterparts, Lilly sued Goodyearfor unlawfully discriminating against her based on gender.
A jury found in her favor, but, of course, Goodyear, whichhas deep pockets and in fact is a defense contractor of our country,went to court. In fact, they had the money to go all the way to theSupreme Court, and the Supreme Court ruled in favor not of Lilly, butof Goodyear.
The Court cited the reason being that the time limit forher claim had passed as the initial discrimination happened nearly 20years earlier. However, Lilly Ledbetter filed her charge as soon as shelearned of the pay discrimination. It was not her fault that it tookalmost 20 years to learn of her situation.
The United States Supreme Court's decision changes the law,limiting any action to 180 days after the first incident ofdiscriminatory activity. In such cases as Lilly Ledbetter's, it tooknearly 20 years to have the discrimination come to light. This decisionlimits the ability of any employee to challenge discriminatory pay.
H.R. 11 will restore the law and justice by clarifying thateach paycheck resulting from a discriminatory pay decision wouldconstitute a new violation of the employment nondiscrimination law andreset the 180-day clock.
Employees do not go around asking each other how much moneythey earn on each paycheck. In fact, many employers even explicitlyprohibit such conversations. It is not like working for Congress, whereour pay is public record. In addition, who would want to go around whenthey are at a new job and ask new coworkers their income and level ofwork experience as well as other data to evaluate if one's own pay isfair, knowing you have 180 days from your first paycheck to file withthe U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission? Who would want tostart a job like that?
Most new employees are more focused on doing their job andworking hard and performing well so that he or she can keep their newposition and continue to earn paychecks. In today's climate, an incomeis more critical than worrying about pay discrimination, but that tooshould not allow this practice to continue.
We cannot allow employers to hide behind a mere 180 daysand potentially successfully carry out pay discrimination day afterday.
Madam Speaker, that is why I'm an original cosponsor of theLilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. It's in memory of our own mother. Thisbill is not only about pay discrimination on the basis of gender, butalso race, religion, national origin, disability or age. This bill isabout doing the right thing to protect the hardworking people of thisNation.
I urge my colleagues to support this important bill as webegin the 111th Congress, and I want to thank Lilly Ledbetter for herlife and for the life of working-class women and men across thiscountry.
Madam Speaker, thank you very much for the opportunity today to support the Lilly Ledbetter Act of 2009, H.R. 11.