Equal Pay Act Research Paper

Words: 798
Pages: 4

Step Towards Fairness: The Equal Pay Act of 1963 On June 10, 1963 President John F. Kennedy signed a bill that would fundamentally change the country called the Equal Pay Act. This law was the first of its kind, designed specifically to end wage disparity and gender discrimination throughout the nation. This Act was part of JFK’s New Frontier Program that aimed "to eradicate poverty and to raise America’s eyes to the stars through the space program."(Robert D. Marcus) Fifty-two years later America has changed noticeably and the effects of the Equal Pay Act have been dramatic. Women have gained tremendous ground in the work force and now even surpassing men’s wages in some fields. But, despite the push towards wage equality, many prominent …show more content…
Hillary Clinton back in 2005 introduced the “Paycheck Fairness Act” which would have amended the EPA’s fourth affirmative defense to permit only bona fide factors other than sex that are job-related or serve a legitimate business interest. Fast-forward to 2015 the now likely Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton is crisscrossing the United States speaking out against unequal pay for women. Even though she only paid he own female employees 72 cents for each dollar she paid to men who worked in her Senate office from 2002 to …show more content…
From June of 1964 to 1971, more than $26 million dollars in back wages were paid to an estimated 71,000 women. Two landmark cases would subsequently help to strengthen and specify the legal standing of the Equal Pay Act. The first case was in 1970 Schultz v. Wheaton Glass Co., in which the Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that jobs needed to be “substantially equal” but not “identical” to fall under the protection of the EPA. That meant that employers couldn’t change the job titles of female workers in order to pay them less than men. Under the EPA this was now considered discrimination this case proved to be a major step forward for women’s rights to equal pay. The second major ruling came from the Supreme Court in 1974 in the court case of Corning Glass Works v. Brennan. The Court ruled that employers could not legitimately vindicate paying women lower wages because they were accustomed to receiving under the “going market rate”. These court cases might seem blatantly discriminatory against women today, but they were quite necessary turning point to ending pay