Gender Discrimination And The Wage Gap Essay

The gender wage gap in America is a social problem that has existed since women entered the workforce. According to the National Committee on Pay Equity, for every dollar earned by a man, a woman made 78.3 cents in 2013 (Leon-Guerrero, 2016). Data from 1983 to 1998 and concluded that women workers in their prime earning years make 38% of what men make. During the 15-year period, an average prime-age working woman earned only $273,592 compared with $722,693 earned by the average working man in 1999 (Leon-Guerrero, 2016). The wage gap affects women of color in a more profound way that it does non-hispanic white women. Hispanic women are making 53%, African American women are making 64%, and Asian American women are making 87% of white men’s earnings each year (AAUW, 2013).

First proposed by Alice Paul, the Equal Rights Act was meant to create an equal workplace for men and women. Born in Mount Laurel Township, New Jersey, Alice Paul grew up in a Quaker family. She was raised in the Quaker faith, and ever since she was a little girl, her parents always instilled in her the importance of fighting for her beliefs. This encouraged her to become active in the equal rights movement, and is most probably one of the reasons she was

Women’s Civil Rights has always been an issue around the world. During World War II, women began working while the men were away at war. Once the men came back, the pay wage began between men and women. According to researchers, Beth Rowen and Borgna Brunner, between 1950 and 1960, women who had worked full-time jobs only earned around 60 cents to every dollar that their male counterparts earned. It was not until June 10, 1963 that the Equal Pay Act was passed by President Kennedy making it illegal for employers to pay women less than men in the same job title. In order to further progress of pay equity, Rosa Cho from Re:Gender.org, also found that President Kennedy proposed a Civil Rights Act to prohibit

In the year 1923, Alice Paul, a famous suffragette, proposed an amendment to the Congress of the United States of America that would explicitly require the United States government to treat men and women equally. This proposed amendment, commonly referred to by the masses as the Equal Rights Amendment, reads as the following:

An important federal employment law that all employees and employers should be aware of is the Equal Pay Act of 1963. As conversed in week nine of class discussion and video lecture, the Equal Pay Act of 1963 ends wage disparity based on sex. The main goal of this act was to ban discrimination in wages, benefits, and pensions based the gender of an employee in any place of employment. Women traditionally earned less than men for doing similar work. The United States has had a long history of knowledge of unequal pay between men and women, but it was not until around World War II that the problem arose and women started fighting for their rights on this issue. Women have tried passing several bills to help close this pay gap throughout the 1950’s, but ended up in failure.

The Equal Pay Act set in the United States in 1963 is a labor law removes the wage inequality between men and women. This was a law that was specifically designed so that everyone is required to be paid the same amount. If a man and a woman are both working the same job title in the same work place there should not be any difference in the amount of pay received. The creation of this law was much more important than many people realized, because women were completing the same jobs but offered less money because of their gender and not quality of their work.The sole purpose of the equal pay is give women the same ability to make a living as a male, which closes the gender pay gap and keeps women for being paid 78 cents on a dollar. This pay act helps hold the employer accountable for making sure no one is not being compensated for things in their job description. In this paper I will speaking about The EEOC Sues Checkers and the Phillips V. Marietta Corp which are two specific cases that shows how people have been discriminated against because of their gender, this highlights the importance of The Equal Pay Act and what it actually stands for.

Luckily for women, the American Women’s rights progressed tremendously since the late 1800’s, and the turning point for females was The Equal Pay Act in 1963. Women wanted more than their primary responsibilities of taking care of the home, children, and family. Although this law contributed significant changes in the development of the women in the workforce, it did come with unethical wages.

The gender wage gap has been a nationwide problem since women were able to enter the workforce. Women have begun to speak out more about the issue and evaluate what they can do to change the industries and how they personally present themselves to help this change. Currently there is a wide range of opinions on this issue, with some saying it does not exist while others think it will ruin the economy if not fixed immediately. This makes it more difficult to address the problem and predict how it will be in the future; however, all sides of the spectrum are becoming more aware of what the gender wage gap means and what they can do to change it. This paper will analyze the different stances on the extent of this social issue as well as the current practices being used to increase knowledge and equalize pay for all.

In 1942, the National War Labor Board urged employers to voluntarily equalize wage and salary rates for women to meet the wages of men. The Equal Pay act was signed in 1963, making it illegal for employers to pay unequal wages to men and women who hold the same job and do the same work, but this hasn’t changed much. Two landmark court cases served to strengthen and further define the Equal Pay Act: Schultz v. Wheaton Glass Co. (1970), U.S. Court of Appeals for

On June 10, 1963, Congress passed the Equal Pay Act this law made it illegal to pay women lower wage rates for the same job strictly based on their sex. Before that, separate job listings for men and women advertised in newspapers with different pay scales for the same jobs with the highest-level jobs advertising for men only. Subsequently, two important court cases, Schultz vs. Wheaton Glass (1970) which ruled jobs only need to be substantially equal and not identical to be protected under the Equal Pay Act and Corning Glass Works vs. Brennan (1974) that determined women could not be paid less simply because they would work at a lower pay rate than men helped to strengthen and further define the Equal Pay Act (Rowen). Although the Equal Pay Act and the civil rights laws that followed helped change the workplace and began to combat wage inequality these laws have not closed the persistent gap between women’s and men’s wages.

This paper explores the sociological effects gender wage gap in all aspects of our society. Gender wage gap is when a Women is paid 79% of what men are paid, the gap is referencing the 21% gap in between what a man is paid and what a women is paid.This topic relates to Sociology because it pertains to social inequality, gender pay Discrimination, gender segregation, gender diversity, patriarchy, feminism, and gender inequality. African Americans and Hispanics have the biggest gap in pay and white and Asian women have the smallest gap. Inequality with Race and wage gap are one in the same when it comes to social inequality they are both a form of discrimination.

In the 21st Century the number of women enrolling in higher education institutions is surpassing the numbers of men enrolled. The graduation rates of women from high school and higher education are most often higher than for men. The number of women graduates from most professional occupations, including higher paying medicine, law and business, will exceed the number of men graduates in the near future. In numerous occupational areas with a majority of women graduates, salaries already surpass salaries in occupational areas with a majority of men graduates.

Discrimination in the United States, has been, and continues to be a very large problem in our country. Although, the country has continued to make outstanding strides on getting rid of discrimination in this country as a whole, it tends to stick around. One of the largest controversies in the workforce today, is that women are continuing to be discriminated against by receiving less pay than males. This problem of women receiving less pay than males in the workforce is known as the Gender Wage Gap.

Additionally, its passage also helped rectify the system of free market capitalism in America, through abolishing an ancient barrier to true merit based selection of employees. The immediate result of the elevating of women’s socio economic status, through offering them a higher wage, was increased participation in both the corporate world as professional employees and the world of higher education as students. In both positions, women held much greater access and leverage to the political system in America, through their active participation and influence in student demonstrations, political movements, and through unions and professional societies, respectively. The Equal Pay Act of 1963 should, in this context, be considered one of the most important pieces of legislation passed in the journey of women to a status of political, economic, and social equality with men in

Inequality has been a dilemma for several years in countless different ways. A persistent problem with disproportion of income between women and men has been lingering within many companies in the United States. It has been said that women earn less money than men in the workplace for many different reasons. Some of these reasons are that women have not spent enough time in the office to be rewarded with raises and bonuses because they are busy with their home lives and taking care of their children, they, unlike men, have been taught to be timid and unaggressive which ultimately steers them away from requesting higher pay, or they do not meet the qualifications to receive promotions (Hymowitz, 2008). This essay is in response to On