GLOBE EDITORIAL
Cheated by Wal-Mart
THE WORLD'S largest private employer,
Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is charged with systematically paying women less than men for the same work and denying women chances to advance. The complaint, certified by a federal judge last month, claims that women are 65 percent of the company's employees but only 33 percent of its managers. Besides the potential financial hit to Wal-Mart, the suit is an embarrassment to a company that prides itself on an almost cult-like "associate team." The company is appealing the certification ruling. Forty years after the Equal Pay Act was passed to address gender employment discrimination, women nationwide are earning 79 cents for every $1 earned by men -- an increase of just 20 cents since 1963. The disparity is partly explained by the fact that women continue to be funneled into the lowest-paying jobs. More than half the country's working women are still in sales, clerical, or service jobs, according to the US Department of Labor. This is particularly frustrating because it does not reflect improvements in women's education over the years. The number of women receiving bachelor's degrees now surpasses men, according to the American Association of University Women. Yet the Department of Labor reports that the median weekly wage for men in managerial or professional positions is $1,099, while women in the same sector earn a median wage of $767 a week. The familiar rationalization that women earn less because they take time off work to raise children is not a large enough factor to account for the wage gap. At least 61 percent of women with children under age 2 and 78 percent of those with school-age children remain in the work force. An October 2003 study by the General Accounting Office found a 20 percent wage gap between men and women even after controlling for factors such as hours worked, job tenure, marital status, and children. The Equal Pay Act needs to be updated. Representative Rosa de Lauro, Democrat of Connecticut, Senator Edward Kenedy, and others have sponsored legislation to put gender bias in employment on the same plane as race or ethnicity by allowing for punitive damages in addition to back pay. The so-called Paycheck Fairness Act would also require employers to submit pay data to the government.
Unfairly shortchanging women allows employers to depress wages across the board. Reversing that is everyone's fight. © Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company.
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