Maria and Wendy knock it out of the ballpark on Today

77 cents on the dollar? It’s even lower if you have a Master’s

By Erin Delmore - MSNBC - Jan. 13, 2014 Read more at http://on.msnbc.com/1hkNAef

For the nearly fifty million Americans living below the poverty line and the more than hundred thousand teetering on the brink, education can be a lifeline to a better future. According to a survey conducted among low-income women for this year’s “Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Pushes Back from the Brink,” three out of four of the women surveyed wished they had put more of a priority on their education and career. Just 58% of Americans among all income levels agreed.

Yet a half a century after President John F. Kennedy signed legislation making gender-based waged disparity illegal, women are still earning less than men who hold the same job. After decades of movement toward parity, the average female-to-male earnings ratio has flatlined at a rate of 77 cents to the dollar. It remains virtually unchanged since 2001.

But a deeper look into the data reveals that women of all education levels – even women who hold bachelor’s and master’s degrees—are plagued by a persistent wage gap.  According to a study by the American Association of University Women, women who are one year out of college earn 7% less than their male counterparts, even when they earned the same degree, at the same kind of school, and are doing the same job for the same number of hours per week. 

The wage gap widens with higher educational attainment: Women who hold a graduate or professional degree earn on average 75.6 cents on each dollar earned by a man with the same level of education in the same position. For women with a college degree, that number ticks up slightly to 79.5 cents on the dollar– virtually in lockstep with women who haven’t earned a high school diploma.

“Overall, a woman with a college degree doing the same work as a man will earn hundreds of thousands of dollars less over the course of her career,” President Obama said at a White House Forum on Women and the Economy in April 2012. “Closing this pay gap—ending this pay discrimination—is about far more than simple fairness, it’s about strengthening families, communities and our entire economy,” he wrote in an op-ed a few days later. 

According to the Center for Women’s Policy Research, the U.S. economy could produce $447.6 billion in additional income if women were paid an equivalent wage to that of their male counterparts. That’s greater than the GDP of the state of Virginia.

   

By Faith Chatham Jan. 5, 2014

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Alice Paul stood up and demanded the right to vote. She went on a hunger strike as a demonstration. She was force fed  and committed to a  sanitorium. When she was examined to be declared insane, her doctor declared:  “Courage in womn is often mistaken for insanity.” 

January 11, 1885, in Moorestown, New Jersey, Paul lived in England after studying at Swarthmore College. While living abroad, she participated in the women's rights movement.

While in London from 1906 to 1909, Paul became politically active and unafraid to use dramatic tactics in support of a cause. She joined the women's suffrage movement in Britain and was arrested on several occasions, serving time in jail and going on a hunger strike. Alice Paul. (2014). The Biography Channel website. Retrieved 01:21, Jan 05, 2014, from http://www.biography.com/people/alice-paul-9435021.

 Returning to the States in 1910, she , she became a leader in the suffragist movement, She was one of the founders of the National Women's Party which advocated for the passage of the 19th Amendment and worked for change at the National Level. Her group was the first to demonstrate at the White House.

"After women won the right to vote with the 19th Amendment in 1920, Paul devoted herself to working on additional empowerment measures for women. In 1923, she introduced the first Equal Rights Amendment in Congress and in later decades worked on the civil rights bill and fair employment practices. Although she did not live to see the ERA added to the U.S. Constitution, she did get an equal rights affirmation included in the preamble to the United Nations charter." Alice Paul. (2014). The Biography Channel website. Retrieved 01:21, Jan 05, 2014, from http://www.biography.com/people/alice-paul-9435021.

Reading Paul's biography reminds us of how long women have been working for passage of the Equal Right's Amendment.

 In 1923, she introduced the first Equal Rights Amendment in Congress and in later decades worked on the civil rights bill and fair employment practices.  The Biography Channel website. Retrieved 01:21, Jan 05, 2014, from http://www.biography.com/people/alice-paul-9435021.

It's been 91 years folks. Let's get this thing ratified! 

Bill Moyers quotes John Nichols who lists passing the ERA as one of the "Five Much-Needed Reforms That Could Make Our Politics Matter Again"

From Bill Moyers Journal:  January 2, 2014 by John Nichols from THE NATION

4. Vote for Equal Rights

The Equal Rights Amendment struggle of the 1970s and early 1980s was an intense, inspiring and heartbreaking fight to finally guarantee equal rights for women. A massive right-wing pushback prevented the project from succeeding at the time — although it opened up debates that would lead to significant progress on a number of legislative fronts. In recent years, there has been something of an ERA renaissance. Three years ago, on the 100th Anniversary of International Women’s Day, then-Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) proposed legislation to eliminate the congressionally imposed deadline for ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment. And in February 2013, the New Mexico state House of Representatives formally asked Congress to lift the deadline for ERA ratification. At the same time, new versions of the amendment have been introduced.

Beyond Washington, 21 state constitutions embrace ERA-like equal rights provisions, and the state of Oregon is likely to see a test in 2014. Late in December, the group VoteERA.org won approval to start gathering 116,284 valid signatures to place a state ERA proposal on the November ballot. “Shouldn’t women be explicitly equal in every Constitution?” Leanne Littrell DiLorenzo, the president of VoteERA.org, told reporters. “To me, the answer is an absolute ‘Yes, of course.’”

Five Much-Needed Reforms That Could Make Our Politics Matter Again | Activism, What Matters Today | BillMoyers.com

Five Much-Needed Reforms That Could Make Our Politics Matter Again | Activism, What Matters Today | BillMoyers.com