Paycheck Fairness Act - Motion to Proceed
Floor Speech
BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT
Madam President, I come to the floor about an hour or so after a vote on a motion to proceed to take up the Paycheck Fairness Act. I struggled with my decision as to whether to move to this measure that I feel was flawed in terms of its approach to a solution or to recognize that perhaps this measure was more of an exercise in political messaging rather than an effort to resolve what I believe is an issue.
In sorting through all aspects of not only the merits of the legislation, but also the facts as they exist back home, the facts as they exist around this country, where we see pay disparity between men and women, I had a lot on my mind. I had a lot to weigh. I did not come to the floor yesterday to speak with the many who rose to either offer proposed amendments to the Paycheck Fairness Act or those who rose to speak to defend the act. I don't want my silence yesterday to be construed that I don't think there is an issue here; that I don't think this is something that needs to be addressed.
Yesterday was national Equal Pay Day, the day when, according to the Department of Labor, women's wages supposedly catch up to men's wages. We can argue and we can debate what that gap is--whether it is 77 cents, whether those statistics are outdated, whether it is closer to 82 cents or what the raw statistics are. We can debate that. But the fact is--and I think the Presiding Officer and I would agree--if there is any discrepancy there, it is worth looking at. Why does a discrepancy exist? Is there disparity that stems from discrimination? Because if it stems from discrimination, it should not be allowed--pretty simply.
In Alaska, the statistics are a little bit different than what we have on the national level.
In my State, Equal Pay Day is not going to occur until May 5.
As an Alaskan, as a woman, and as one who has been in the Alaska job market, I want to know: Why the greater disparity in my State?
We had a women's summit in Anchorage, AK, last October. I worked with a former colleague in the Alaska State legislature to host a summit designed to look at many of the issues women face in Alaska, whether it is pay disparity, childcare affordability, access to health care--so many of the issues and concerns women all over the country deal with day to day. We relied on a study from the state Legislative Research Services. A portion of the research tried to drill down into some of the pay disparities we have in the State.
In 2010 our State Department of Labor reported a wage gap of 67 cents or 33 percent. This statistic is different from the overall national averages because that review conducted by Legislative Research Services included part-time as well as full-time workers and part-time workers generally receive lower salaries. That may be one reason for the disparity.
But when we look at some of the areas where there are discrepancies, it really does cause one to say: Wait a minute. In areas where occupations are significantly male-dominated--crab fishermen, for instance, welders on the pipeline--occupations where the pay is really quite substantial, we might look at that and say, OK, I understand why there might be a discrepancy. But there are other occupations that have some surprising statistics. For example, back in 2010 the average earnings for a male physician were $229,312, but the average for a woman physician was $166,000. It doesn't make sense.
In certain areas, women out-earn men--dietitians, for instance. The ratio of women's to men's earnings is 170 percent, according to the raw numbers. For legal secretaries, the ratio of women's to men's earnings is 132 percent. For teachers, the ratio of women's to men's earnings is 125 percent.
We need to peel back the onion to understand what we are dealing with--is this a situation where it is the difference in the career choice that has made the distinction with the pay disparity? If that is the case, what are we doing to encourage women to go into areas where, quite clearly, earning opportunities are better?
When we look at occupations, I think it is something that needs to be considered. When we talk about a wage disparity, a pay disparity, I think we need to look very critically at whether there are other factors that come into play. Is it a career choice? Is it the need or desire for flexibility?
Starting out as a young lawyer in Anchorage, I was making what the young men in the firm were making. But when my husband and I decided that I wanted to spend more time at home with our boys, I negotiated for that level of flexibility. That put me behind my male counterparts in the firm. I was good with that. That was a choice I made. I wanted that flexibility.
Are there other nonmonetary forms of compensation that perhaps the wage gap statistics don't necessarily respect? We don't know. So this is where I came down in my decision process as to which direction to take on the Paycheck Fairness Act vote that we had just an hour or so ago. Do we want to try to address what I believe is an issue in that we do have a disparity but how we understand what causes that disparity and, then, what we do with that going forward is an important consideration.
We have the Equal Pay Act of 1963 that imposes strict liability for wage disparity based on gender. It is in law. We have title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that protects against all forms of employment discrimination, including on the basis of sex. But maybe we are not enforcing these Federal laws as we need to. If after all these years we are still seeing areas of disparity that we cannot reconcile based on occupation or based on desire for flexibility, does there continue to be discrimination? That is what we need to get to.
That is why I and many of my colleagues supported some of the amendments that were presented yesterday and I think were important to present--to make sure there is no retaliation for a woman when she inquires as to what others are making to determine whether there is discrimination, so making sure we are able to access that information. However, when we take a proposal like the Paycheck Fairness Act that has an initial presumption that the employer has unlawfully discriminated against an employee if there is a difference in pay--if we start off with a presumption of discrimination, it is pretty hard for an employer--particularly a small employer--to deal with that, to defend that, to present the case, to really work through this issue.
The solution should not be more litigation as the Paycheck Fairness Act response is here. The solution needs to be more all-encompassing because we have laws on the books that already say it is illegal to discriminate. If we are still seeing instances of discrimination--and, again, let's figure out where and why and how--then let's honestly try to address that rather than through messaging efforts that are designed to elevate the issue, which is fair, but then not be pragmatic about how we approach the solutions.
I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an article from this morning's Washington Post titled "President Obama's persistent `77-cent' claim on wage gap gets a new Pinocchio rating.''
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:
[From the Washington Post, Apr. 9, 2014]
President Obama's Persistent `77 cent' Claim on the Wage Gap Gets a New Pinocchio Rating
(By Glenn Kessler)
``Today, the average full-time working woman earns just 77 cents for every dollar a man earns ..... in 2014, that's an embarrassment. It is wrong.''
--President Obama, remarks on equal pay for equal work, April 8, 2014
In 2012, during another election season, The Fact Checker took a deep dive in the statistics behind this factoid and found it wanting. We awarded the president only a Pinocchio, largely because he is citing Census Bureau data, but have wondered since then if we were too generous.
We also called out the president when he used this fact in the 2013 State of the Union address. And in the 2014 State of the Union address. And yet he keeps using it. So now it's time for a reassessment.
The Truth Teller video above also goes through the details.
THE FACTS
Few experts dispute that there is a wage gap, but differences in the life choices of men and women--such as women tending to leave the workforce when they have children--make it difficult to make simple comparisons.Obama is using a figure (annual wages, from the Census Bureau) that makes the disparity appear the greatest-23 cents. But the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the gap is 19 cents when looking at weekly wages. The gap is even smaller when you look at hourly wages--it is 14 cents--but then not every wage earner is paid on an hourly basis, so that statistic excludes salaried workers.
In other words, since women in general work fewer hours than men in a year, the statistics used by the White House may be less reliable for examining the key focus of the proposed Paycheck Fairness Act--wage discrimination. For instance, annual wage figures do not take into account the fact that teachers--many of whom are women--have a primary job that fills nine months out of the year. The weekly wage is more of an apples-to-apples comparison, but it does not include as many income categories.
June O'Neill, a former director of the Congressional Budget Office, has noted that the wage gap is affected by a number of factors, including that the average woman has less work experience than the average man and that more of the weeks worked by women are part-time rather than full-time. Women also tend to leave the work force for periods in order to raise children, seek jobs that may have more flexible hours but lower pay and choose careers that tend to have lower pay.
Indeed, BLS data show that women who do not get married have virtually no wage gap; they earn 96 cents for every dollar a man makes.
Economists at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis surveyed economic literature and concluded that "research suggests that the actual gender wage gap (when female workers are compared with male workers who have similar characteristics) is much lower than the raw wage gap.'' They cited one survey, prepared in 2009 for the Labor Department, which concluded that when such differences are accounted for, much of the hourly wage gap dwindled, to about 5 cents on the dollar.
``This study leads to the unambiguous conclusion that the differences in the compensation of men and women are the result of a multitude of factors and that the raw wage gap should not be used as the basis to justify corrective action. Indeed, there may be nothing to correct,'' the report for the Labor Department said. ``The differences in raw wages may be almost entirely the result of the individual choices being made by both male and female workers.''
A 2013 article in the Daily Beast, citing a Georgetown University survey on the economic value of different college majors, showed how nine of the 10 most remunerative majors were dominated by men:
1. Petroleum Engineering: 87% male
2. Pharmacy Pharmaceutical Sciences and Administration: 48% male
3. Mathematics and Computer Science: 67% male
4. Aerospace Engineering: 88% male
5. Chemical Engineering: 72% male
6. Electrical Engineering: 89% male
7. Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering: 97% male
8. Mechanical Engineering: 90% male
9. Metallurgical Engineering: 83% male
10. Mining and Mineral Engineering: 90% male
Meanwhile, nine of the 10 least remunerative majors were dominated by women:
1. Counseling Psychology: 74% female
2. Early Childhood Education: 97% female
3. Theology and Religious Vocations: 34% female
4. Human Services and Community Organization: 81% female
5. Social Work: 88% female
6. Drama and Theater Arts: 60% female
7. Studio Arts: 66% female
8. Communication Disorders Sciences and Services: 94% female
9. Visual and Performing Arts: 77% female
10. Health and Medical Preparatory Programs: 55% female
The White House discovered this week that calculations using average wages can yield unsatisfactory results. McClatchy newspapers did the math and reported that when the same standards that generated the 77-cent figure were applied to White House salaries, women overall at the White House make 91 cents for every dollar men make. White House spokesman Jay Carney protested that the review ``looked at the aggregate of everyone on staff, and that includes from the most junior levels to the most senior.'' But that's exactly what the Census Department does.
Betsey Stevenson, a member of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, acknowledged to reporters that the 77-cent figure did not reflect equal pay for equal work. "Seventy-seven cents captures the annual earnings of full-time, full-year women divided by the annual earnings of full-time, full-year men,'' she said. "There are a lot of things that go into that 77-cents figure, there are a lot of things that contribute and no one's trying to say that it's all about discrimination, but I don't think there's a better figure.''
Carney noted that the White House wage gap was narrower than the national average, but the White House actually lags the District average calculated by the BLS: 95 cents.
THE PINOCCHIO TEST
From a political perspective, the Census Department's 77-cent figure is golden. Unless women stop getting married and having children, and start abandoning careers in childhood education for naval architecture, this huge gap in wages will almost certainly persist. Democrats thus can keep bringing it up every two years.
There appears to be some sort of wage gap and closing it is certainly a worthy goal. But it's a bit rich for the president to repeatedly cite this statistic as an ``embarrassment.'' (His line in the April 8 speech was almost word for word what he said in the 2014 State of the Union address.) The president must begin to acknowledge that average annual wages does not begin to capture what is actually happening in the work force and society.
Thus we are boosting the rating on this factoid to Two Pinocchios. We were tempted to go one step further to Three Pinocchios, but the president is relying on an official government statistic--and there are problems and limitations with the other calculations as well.
TWO PINOCCHIOS
Ms. MURKOWSKI. Included in this article is the following quote referencing a study by the Census Bureau:
This study leads to the unambiguous conclusion that the differences in the compensation of men and women are the result of a multitude of factors and that the raw wage gap should not be used as the basis to justify corrective action. Indeed, there may be nothing to correct.
I don't know that. There indeed may be more that we can correct. I am willing to look to see, to continue to peel back this onion to see if we can do more than we did with the Equal Pay Act of 1963, do more than we did with the Civil Rights Act of 1964, do more than we did with the Lilly Ledbetter Act that I supported several years ago. If there is more that needs to be done, I am willing to work on it because I don't want to be in a State where men are viewed as being paid $1 to the 67 cents that a woman is being paid. I don't want those statistics to be valid. I don't want them to play out in my State. I want to understand how we ensure that there is a level of fairness. I think we need to make sure we look keenly to the issue of whether there is discrimination at play or whether, in fact, there are a host of other issues we need to consider as well. I am willing to work in good faith with my colleagues to do just that.
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