Equal Pay: How Long will it Take?

In the U.S., on average, women earn only 77 cents for every dollar men earn, and for women of color the numbers are worse: African-American women earn approximately 69 cents on a man's dollar, while Latina women earn only 59 cents. Professional women stand to lose from $700,000 to $2 million dollars over the course of their lives because of pay discrimination. If working class women earned dollar for dollar what men earned, New York families would bring in an average of $4,000 more per year and poverty rates would be cut in half. Forget about the 9 to 5. If women worked the equivalent of what their work is valued, they’d be clocking out at 3:15 every day.

Equal Pay Day was established in 1996  by the National Committee on Pay Equity (NCPE) as a public awareness event to illuminate the gap between men's and women's wages. Equal Pay Day symbolizes the point into the next year to which a woman must work to achieve pay equity for the previous year. In 2010, NOW-NYC launched the Equal Pay Day Walk-Out. This kick-off event called attention to just how much those 'unpaid hours' add up after a lifetime of work.

• Wear red on Equal Pay Day to symbolize how far women and minorities are "in the red".
• Walk-out at 3:15pm with NOW-NYC on the next Equal Pay Day on April 16, 2012. OR, organize your own walk-out at your place of work or school.
• Negotiate yourself a better salary: Learn how!
• Educate yourself: Know your workplace rights
• Employers: Use this 10-step guide to complete a self-audit and see how your policies measure up. You can also allow female employees to clock-out at 3:15pm on the next Equal Pay Day or show your support for fair pay by hosting your own business-wide walk-out.

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