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This stuff just writes itself. I've been out of town on college tours with my daughter for the past two days and as I slogged through the mountains of email, these two news alerts were right next to each other. Yes, these things happened on the same day.
That video at the top is President Obama's remarks at the White House Forum on Women and the Economy. Here's a snippet of what he said after making some heartfelt remarks about the impact of women in his life, especially his grandmother and mother.
Now, think about it. When women make less than men for the same work, that hurts families who have to get by with less and businesses who have fewer customers with less to spend. When a job doesn’t offer family leave to care for a new baby or sick leave to care for an ailing parent, that burdens men as well. When an insurance plan denies women coverage because of preexisting conditions, that puts a strain on emergency rooms and drives up costs of care for everybody. When any of our citizens can’t fulfill the potential that they have because of factors that have nothing to do with talent, or character, or work ethic, that diminishes us all. It holds all of us back. And it says something about who we are as Americans.
Right now, women are a growing number of breadwinners in the household. But they’re still earning just 77 cents for every dollar a man does -- even less if you’re an African American or Latina woman. 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.
Independently of the President's effort, another executive was making some decisions about how important women are to the economy as well, via Huffington Post:
A Wisconsin law that made it easier for victims of wage discrimination to have their day in court was repealed on Thursday, after Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) quietly signed the bill.
The 2009 Equal Pay Enforcement Act was meant to deter employers from discriminating against certain groups by giving workers more avenues via which to press charges. Among other provisions, it allows individuals to plead their cases in the less costly, more accessible state circuit court system, rather than just in federal court.
In November, the state Senate approved SB 202, which rolled back this provision. On February, the Assembly did the same. Both were party-line votes in Republican-controlled chambers.
SB 202 was sent to Walker on March 29. He had, according to the state constitution, six days to act on the bill. The deadline was 5:00 p.m. on Thursday. The governor quietly signed the bill into law on Thursday, according to the Legislative Reference Bureau, and it is now called Act 219.
Mitt Romney says he will win back women because women care about the economy. What part of his good buddy Scott Walker's rollback of ways for women to push for equal pay does he think bolsters his case?
