[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 3]
[Senate]
[Pages 3949-3954]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         NATIONAL EQUAL PAY DAY

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Hawaii for her 
leadership on this issue, and I will be yielding the floor to the lead 
sponsor of today's effort.
  Our Nation is built on the belief that anyone who works hard should 
have the opportunity to achieve the American dream. Yet there are women 
across this country who are doing the same job as their male colleagues 
and being paid less. That is why today, on National Equal Pay Day, I 
stand with my fellow Senators to renew our efforts to ensure equal pay 
for equal work.
  Fifty years after the passage of the Equal Pay Act, women still only 
earn 79 cents on every dollar paid to a man. This wage gap is even 
worse for women of color. African-American women who work full time 
make only 60 cents for every dollar paid to white males. Hispanic women 
earn only 55 cents.
  Women are paid less even when factors such as age, education, 
occupation, and work hours are taken into consideration. In nearly 
every occupation in our country, women's median earnings are less than 
their male competitors. It is no different for women in my State of 
Illinois. The median earning for Illinois women is $10,000 less than 
the median earning for men. While African-American women in Illinois 
make slightly more than the national average, Hispanic women are paid 
even less--48 cents on the dollar. Think about that. Hispanic women are 
making less than half the earnings of their male coworkers who have 
similar levels of education and do the same job. This isn't right, and 
it isn't fair.
  The gender wage gap translates into nearly $11,000 less in median 
earnings for women each year and over $430,000 in lost wages over a 
lifetime. Now that women are the sole or primary breadwinners in 4 out 
of 10 families, this means less money for food, housing, and education. 
It is no wonder the poverty rate for female heads of households 
continues to be disproportionately high.
  This disparity follows women into their retirement since retirement 
savings and Social Security are based on income earned. In Illinois, 
the average weekly Social Security benefit for female retirees is 77.3 
percent of the average for Illinois males per week. While female 
retirees receive less, on average, compared to men under Social 
Security, women tend to live longer and spend more on medical care, 
forcing them to do more with less.
  What would happen if we closed this wage gap? Amazing things. Sixty 
percent of women would earn more if they were paid the same wages as 
their male counterparts, nearly two-thirds of single working mothers 
would receive a pay increase, and the poverty rate for women would be 
cut in half. It would mean fewer families in poverty and fewer families 
would need safety net programs. Equal pay for equal work would also 
mean women and their families would have more to spend on basic goods 
and services, and that is good for our economy.
  So what do we have to do to close this wage gap? We can pass the 
Paycheck Fairness Act introduced by my colleague Senator Mikulski and 
my friend and colleague Senator Murray. Employers still maintain 
policies that punish employees who voluntarily share salary information 
with coworkers. This makes it nearly impossible for employees to find 
out whether they are being paid fairly.
  This bill would provide women the same remedies for pay 
discrimination as people who are subjected to discrimination based on 
race and national origin. It would also close loopholes in current law 
that still permit retaliation against workers who disclose their wages.
  The Paycheck Fairness Act would build on the success of the Lilly 
Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which clarified the 180-day statute of 
limitations for filing a lawsuit on pay discrimination that resets with 
each affected paycheck. This was the first bill signed into law by 
President Obama in 2009. The Senator from Maryland remembers that day 
because President Obama signed the bill, took the first pen that he 
used to sign it, and handed it to the Senator from Maryland.
  Ms. MIKULSKI. Yes.
  Mr. DURBIN. I remember that because I stood there and thought: That 
is entirely appropriate that a Senator who has dedicated her life to 
this kind of fairness and equality for women at work would receive the 
first pen from the first bill signed into law by this new President.
  My Republican colleagues: Why aren't you with us on this issue? Don't 
you agree that your daughter should be paid the same as your son for 
doing the same work? It is a basic issue of fairness. It shouldn't have 
anything to do with party labels, so we invite you to join us. This 
should not be a partisan issue at all. Certainly for women at work, it 
is not partisan. It is just a matter of fairness. I urge my colleagues 
to support this legislation.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland.
  Ms. MIKULSKI. Mr. President, I come to the floor to join my 
colleagues in calling for equal pay for equal work for women.
  I just left the President of the United States. He is right up the 
street at the Sewall-Belmont House. This is the home of the National 
Woman's Party in which so much organizing and strategizing took place 
to get women the right to vote. The President is there to declare that 
building a national monument to commemorate the tremendous work that 
was involved in getting suffrage, under the Antiquities Act, and that 
is his right to create that.
  It is not only the building we want to preserve. It is not only the 
records of the battle for suffrage that we want to preserve and be able 
to display. It is what it stands for: the fact that women are included 
fully in our society.
  We had to fight every single day in every single way to be able to 
advance ourselves. Even when the men were in Philadelphia writing the 
Constitution, thinking great thoughts and doing great deeds, Abigail 
Adams was back in New England running the family farm, keeping the 
family together, and she wrote John a letter saying: Don't forget the 
ladies because if you do, we will ferment our own revolution.
  In our country, we call revolutions social movements where ordinary 
people organize and mobilize to accomplish great deeds to move 
democracy forward. It took us over 150 years to get the right to vote 
in 1920. We are coming up on the anniversary of suffrage, but it is not 
only that we got the right to vote, it is what that right to vote 
means. We wanted to be able to participate fully in our society. We 
wanted to be able to exercise our voice in terms of choosing leaders 
who will choose the right policies. Along the way, we have been 
advocating those policies.
  In 1963, working with the President, who was committed to civil 
rights, Lyndon Johnson, the equal pay for equal work act was passed as 
part of a great step forward in three major civil rights bills. We 
thought we had settled the issue, but, no, 50 years later we have only 
gained 19 cents--19 cents. At that rate, it will take us until 2058 to 
get equal pay for equal work. That is not the way it should be. We need 
to make sure we eliminate the barriers and impediments that allow this 
to keep happening.
  When we women fight for equal pay, we are often sidelined, redlined, 
pink-slipped, harassed, or intimidated. We

[[Page 3950]]

are often confronted with: Why are you doing this? And then we are 
often harassed for doing it.
  People may say: Senator Barb, didn't you take care of that when you 
passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act in 2009. The Lilly Ledbetter 
legislation, of which I am so proud, has kept the courthouse doors open 
by changing the statute of limitations, but now we need to pass 
legislation to end the loopholes that are often strangleholds on women 
getting equal pay in the first place.
  I have legislation pending called the Paycheck Fairness Act. That 
Paycheck Fairness Act does three things. First of all, it stops 
retaliation for even sharing pay information in the workplace. Right 
now, if you ask, you are forbidden to tell, or get fired. If you ask, 
you are forbidden to tell, or get fired, or if you are a man working 
side by side with a woman and you want her to know that as a nurse, as 
a computer software engineer, what your pay is, and there is an 
opportunity, she could get fired and he could get fired. This is wrong.
  We also want to stop employers from using any reason to pay women 
less, such as he has a better education. Use the same education for the 
same job. We are willing to compete. We are out there. More women are 
in college. More women are Phi Beta Kappas. More women are getting 
ahead.
  Then we heard: He has to be paid more because he is the breadwinner. 
What are we, crumbs? If he wins the bread, we want to be winners too. 
Very often it is women in the marketplace who are now either the sole 
breadwinner or also a significant breadwinner, and the men or the 
partner they love says: We want you to get equal pay for equal work as 
well.
  So we don't want to hear: He is the breadwinner. We don't want the 
crumbs anymore. We want to be paid equal pay for equal work. We also 
want punitive damages for women who are discriminated against. Backpay 
alone is not a strong enough deterrent.
  I want my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to know they have 
ideas. One of my colleagues spoke on the floor earlier today. I have 
such admiration for her. She is a fine Senator, and she agrees with the 
thrust of the press conference we had. We have faced this in the past, 
where we share the same goal, but we differ on means. My means, I must 
say, are the way forward. These means are the way forward because they 
solve the problems.
  Of course, we will sit down and talk, have conversations, and see 
what we can do, but at the end of the day, we face this issue: It costs 
more to be a woman. Women pay more for everything. Women pay more in 
medical costs than men, given the same age and the same health status. 
Women pay a significant amount of money for childcare. Guess what. 
Women get charged more for dry cleaning. We have to pay more for our 
blouses being cleaned than men to have their shirts washed and pressed.
  We are tired of being taken to the cleaners. We want equal pay for 
equal work. Whether we are U.S. Senators, whether we are nurses or 
executive assistants or others, we want equal pay for equal work.
  We stand with the women's soccer team. They kick the ball around, but 
we are tired of being kicked around. So give us equal pay for equal 
work. Pass the Mikulski coeffort to get equal pay for equal work. I 
think we can then move forward. Why should our women go to the Olympics 
winning the gold, when they don't get paid the gold? So it is time for 
a change, time for a difference, and time for something we can do.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
  Ms. WARREN. Mr. President, I wish to say a special thank-you to 
Senator Mikulski for her terrific leadership on all of this.
  Today is Equal Pay Day. By the sound of it, one would think it is 
some sort of historic holiday commemorating the anniversary of a 
landmark day that our country guaranteed equal pay for women, but that 
is not what it is about--not even close--because in the year 2016, at a 
time when we have self-driving cars and computers that fit on our 
wrists, women still make only 79 cents for every $1 a man makes, and we 
are still standing in the U.S. Congress debating whether a woman should 
get fired for asking what the guy down the hall makes for doing exactly 
the same job.
  So why do we recognize April 12 as Equal Pay Day? It took the average 
woman working from January 1 of last year until today to make as much 
as the average man made in 2015. That means she had to work an extra 
3\1/2\ months in order to make what a man made last year, and that 
means, once again, she starts the year in a hole.
  Equal Pay Day isn't a national day of celebration. It is a national 
day of embarrassment.
  We hear a lot about how the economy is improving, and there is good 
news to point to. Unemployment is under 5 percent, GDP continues to 
rise, the stock market is up, but too many families across the country 
feel like the game is rigged against them. They work hard, they play by 
the rules, and they still struggle to make ends meet. Here is the 
thing: They are right. The game is rigged against working families, and 
pay discrimination is part of that.
  For women, it has been a one-two punch in the gut. For decades, wages 
have flattened out for American workers, and for women the wage gap 
just compounds that problem. If we closed both the productivity wage 
gap and the gender wage gap from 1979 to 2014, women's median hourly 
wages would be 70 percent higher today.
  Even though we have solid data, the Republicans in Washington refuse 
to act. Heck, they would rather spend their time trying to defund 
Planned Parenthood health clinics and cut women's access to birth 
control than do anything--anything at all--to give working women a 
raise.
  So, yes, the game is rigged when women earn less than men for doing 
the same work. It is rigged when women can be fired for asking how much 
the guy down the hall makes for doing the same job. It is rigged when 
women have to choose between healthy pregnancies and getting their 
paychecks. It is rigged when women can get fired just for requesting a 
regular work schedule to go back to school or get a second job. It is 
rigged when women earn less their whole lives so that their Social 
Security checks are smaller and their student loans are bigger. The 
game is rigged against women and families, and it has to stop.
  I am standing with my colleagues today. I am standing with women and 
friends of women all over the country to demand equal pay for equal 
work. It is 2016--not 1916--and it is long past time to eliminate 
gender discrimination in the workforce. This is about economics, but it 
is also about our values. It is about who we are as a people and what 
kind of country we are trying to build for both our sons and our 
daughters.
  Today, we recognize Equal Pay Day, and we fight today because we 
don't want to have to recognize it year after year after year in the 
future.
  I thank the Presiding Officer and yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wisconsin.
  Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. President, I come to the floor today on Equal Pay 
Day to stand up and speak out about an issue that impacts women and 
families in every State across this great country. I rise to give voice 
to the fact that there is paycheck inequality for working women across 
this country, and it is time that we do something about it.
  Working women make up over 50 percent of our workforce, and they are 
working harder than ever to get ahead. But far too many are barely 
getting by, and far too many women and children are living in poverty. 
In Wisconsin, the economy is lagging behind other States. Household 
incomes are falling and communities across our State are experiencing 
job loss and layoffs. In fact, recent reports have concluded that 
poverty in Wisconsin has reached alarming levels.
  The least we can do is to level the playing field and give women a 
fair shot at getting ahead, because they deserve equal pay for equal 
work. So I am proud to join several of my colleagues

[[Page 3951]]

today to deliver a call for action to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act.
  I would like to share the story of Shannon. Shannon is a single 
mother of three from Two Rivers, WI. She is working hard to support her 
family. In order to help her family get ahead, Shannon has continued 
her education to advance her career as an interpreter in a school. But 
she faces the grim reality that women teachers are often paid less than 
their male counterparts.
  It is not just teaching. When we look at men and women working 
equivalent jobs across different industries, women are making less than 
their male counterparts across the country. This paycheck inequality is 
holding women back, and it is holding our entire economy back. Closing 
the gender pay gap would give Shannon and her family more financial 
freedom to better deal with the daily issues that working moms face. 
Whether it is an unexpected car problem or children outgrowing their 
clothing and their shoes, whether it is help to pay off student loan 
debt or the ability to save a little bit of their paycheck to ensure 
that their kids have a chance for a higher education, working families 
across America need paycheck fairness to ensure they have a fair shot 
at getting ahead.
  Millions of American women get up every day to work hard for that 
middle class dream--a good job that pays the bills, health care 
coverage you can rely on, a home that you can call your own, and a 
secure retirement. But instead, gender discrimination in pay is holding 
women and their families back.
  Let's pass the Paycheck Fairness Act and strengthen families and our 
economy by providing working women with the tools they need to close 
the gender pay gap. By taking action, we will show the American people 
our commitment to building an economy that works for everyone, not just 
those at the top.
  Before I yield, I wish to take a moment to thank and recognize the 
senior Senator from Maryland, Barbara Mikulski, for her tremendous 
leadership on this issue. It has been an honor to serve alongside such 
a champion for women and families, and I am looking forward to 
continuing this particular fight together and winning this fight 
together.
  I thank the Presiding Officer, and I yield back.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland.
  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, let me first thank Senator Baldwin for her 
comments. I agree with her statement, and I am also grateful for the 
leadership of the senior Senator from Maryland and the leadership 
Senator Mikulski has shown on gender issues. The paycheck fairness 
legislation is just a recent example of her extraordinary leadership 
throughout her career on gender equity issues.
  I particularly wanted to be here not only to say how proud I am of 
Senator Mikulski but also to state that the Paycheck Fairness Act is 
not about women. It is about families, about our economy, and about 
fairness. It is about American values. It affects everyone in America. 
We all should be personally engaged in making sure paycheck fairness 
becomes law. To this Senator, it is outrageous that a woman has to work 
5 days at the same work that a man works in 4 days for the same pay. 
That is inherently unfair and needs to be corrected. The Paycheck 
Fairness Act would do that.
  I note that today is Equal Pay Day, which basically reflects how long 
a woman has to work--basically without getting a paycheck--in order to 
get paid for the same amount of work as a man does in a year.
  As the Presiding Officer knows, as a member of the Senate Foreign 
Relations Committee, this Senator has the privilege of being the 
ranking member on the committee. One thing we look at is how other 
countries deal with basic rights. One of those rights is how they treat 
their women. One of the barometers for determining how well a country 
does is how well they are treating women. If they treat women well, 
they are generally doing much better.
  The truth of the matter is, in many cases women do better in 
investments than men. They invest in children, families, and economic 
growth, whereas men are more likely to invest in war. We see much more 
economic growth where women are treated fairly in other countries.
  It is an important value for America. We have promoted gender equity 
issues in our foreign policy, our development assistance, and in our 
diplomacy. But for us to be effective globally, we first need to take 
care of our issues at home.
  The Paycheck Fairness Act would do exactly that. It would deal with 
the issue of fairness in the workplace in America. We are not where we 
need to be. Everybody talks about the fact that women aren't paid as 
much; and that is true. But if you happen to be a minority, it is even 
worse. We need to take care of this for the sake of the American 
economy, for our values, et cetera.
  This Senator has introduced legislation that would allow us to pick 
up the ratification of the equal rights amendment so that we could have 
in the Constitution of the United States fairness with no gender 
discrimination. This would be a lot easier. We only need three States 
in order to ratify it and to become a part of our Constitution. The 
late Justice Scalia noted accurately that there is nothing in the 
Constitution that requires discrimination against women; but there is 
nothing in the Constitution that protects discrimination based upon 
gender. We can do a better job with fundamental changes.
  What we can do in this Congress now is to take on paycheck fairness. 
That can get done in this Congress and can be effective this year and 
can be the legacy of this Congress. I would urge my colleagues: Let's 
do this. We all talk about gender equity issues. With the bill that is 
pending on paycheck fairness, we can act and we can act now. We can 
make a major change in American policy that will not only be fair to 
women but will be fair to all Americans and allow our economy to grow.
  With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Mrs. SHAHEEN. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my esteemed 
colleague from Maryland, who is here with a number of other people to 
talk about the need to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act to make sure that 
we end once and for all paycheck discrimination against women.
  I think the American people believe very strongly in fairness, equal 
treatment, and a level playing field for everyone, because these are 
core American values. I think that is why people find it shocking and 
unacceptable that women in the United States continue to be denied 
equal pay for equal work.
  More than half a century ago, President Kennedy signed into law the 
Equal Pay Act, yet today wage discrimination continues as an ugly 
reality across our Nation. Women earn only about 79 cents for every $1 
men earn. It is a disparity that exists at all levels of education, in 
nearly every industry, across hundreds of occupations, from elite 
professionals to everyday blue-collar workers. There are complex 
factors that contribute to the gender pay gap, but according to a new 
study by the Joint Economic Committee, as much as 40 percent of the pay 
gap can be attributed to outright discrimination.
  Probably, most people who have watched TV in the last couple of weeks 
have seen one particularly egregious example that has been cited, and 
that is the U.S. women's soccer team, whose members make only about 
one-quarter of what their male counterparts make. Both the women's and 
men's soccer teams work for the same employer, the U.S. Soccer 
Federation. The women's soccer team generates significantly more 
revenue than the men's team. It has won the Women's World Cup three 
times, including last year. It has been the Olympic champion four times 
and has been the world's top-ranked team for nearly two decades. Yet 
they are paid a quarter of what men make. It is hard to understand that 
under any circumstances except outright discrimination.
  As outrageous as that case is, the wage gap is even more damaging to 
the

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40 percent of American women who are sole or primary breadwinners in 
households with children, to the women who are waitresses and certified 
nursing assistants, and to secretaries who work at jobs where equal pay 
is not only about fairness but it is also about providing adequately 
for their families. It is about being able to afford Internet access so 
their kids can do their homework. It is about paying for their child's 
inhaler. There is a lot that women breadwinners can do with that extra 
$10,800 that women would earn on average if it were not for pay 
discrimination.
  I also serve as the ranking member on the Senate's Small Business and 
Entrepreneurship Committee, and I have seen how similar gender gaps 
confront women-owned small businesses. Just as women on average are 
paid 21 percent less than men, a recent Commerce Department study found 
that the odds of businesses owned by women winning a Federal contract 
are about 21 percent lower than for otherwise similar companies--for 
male-owned enterprises.
  In workplaces across America, women are speaking out more and more 
and are demanding equal pay. It is time for Congress to do our job as 
well. I know from experience that legislation can make a difference. As 
Governor, I signed a law to prohibit gender-based pay discrimination in 
New Hampshire and to require equal pay for equal work. We haven't made 
as much progress as I would like at this point, but at the time we 
signed that law, women in New Hampshire were making 69 percent of their 
male colleagues' wages. Today, they are making 76 percent or a little 
less than the national average.
  Back in the early 1980s, I served on New Hampshire's Commission on 
the Status of Women. I chaired a report on employment in New Hampshire. 
At that time, women were only making 59 cents for every dollar a man 
earned. The conclusion of that report was that this has an impact not 
just on women, but it is an impact on, of course, their whole family. 
It is something that their children, their husbands, and their entire 
family is affected by. If we can close this pay gap for women, it helps 
not only the women who make up two-thirds of minimum wage workers, but 
it helps their families. It helps pull their kids out of poverty.
  We need to do more at the Federal level, and that is why I strongly 
support the Paycheck Fairness Act. This legislation would empower women 
to negotiate for equal pay, it would close loopholes that courts 
created in the laws that are already in place, and it would create 
strong incentives for employers to obey these laws.
  This legislation is about basic fairness. It is about equal 
treatment. It is about creating a level playing field in the workplace 
for our daughters and our granddaughters and for every American. It 
also is about making sure that their spouses, their children, and their 
relatives benefit from making sure that they have the same access to 
equal pay as the men in the workplace do.
  So I urge my colleagues to support the Paycheck Fairness Act. Sixteen 
years into the 20th century is way past time to make good on our 
promise of equal pay for equal work in the United States.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, we are 103 days into 2016, and on Equal 
Pay Day, that number takes on significant, unfortunate meaning. Women 
have to work 103 extra days to match what men earned last year. That is 
unacceptable. Workers should be paid fairly for the work they do, 
regardless of their gender. Closing the wage gap would help grow our 
economy from the middle out, not from the top down.
  I am glad to be here today with my colleagues to recognize Equal Pay 
Day, to stand up on behalf of women across the country, and to renew 
our call to put an end to the wage gap. Last year, I heard from a woman 
named Sandy from Seattle. Right out of college, Sandy got a job at a 
local nonprofit. After a couple of months of work, she was just 
chatting with a male colleague and found out he was offered 20 percent 
more in salary for doing the exact same job. She thought there had been 
some mistake. But when she asked about it, her boss told her they could 
not offer her a pay raise because of budget constraints.
  Sandy's story is so common. On average, women today make 79 cents for 
every dollar a man makes. The pay gap is even wider for women of color. 
That is not just unfair to women; it hurts our families, and it hurts 
our economy. Today, 60 percent of working families rely on wages from 
two earners--60 percent.
  More than ever, women are likely to be the primary breadwinner for 
their family. Women's success in today's economy is critical to 
families' economic security and to our Nation's economy as a whole. We 
need to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act to help close the wage gap. I so 
appreciate Senator Mikulski's tremendous leadership and passion on this 
issue. Her Paycheck Fairness Act would make it unlawful for employers 
to retaliate against workers for discussing pay. It does so in a 
commonsense way that reflects today's reality in the workplace.
  It would empower women to negotiate for equal pay. It would close 
significant loopholes in the Equal Pay Act. It would create strong 
incentives for employers to provide equal pay. Passing the Paycheck 
Fairness Act is a critical stop on the long list of things we can do to 
build our economy from the middle out and make sure our country works 
for all families, not just the wealthiest few.
  No matter where they live, no matter their background, no matter what 
career they choose, on average, women earn less than their male 
colleagues, even women soccer players on the U.S. Women's National 
Team. The Women's National Team has won three World Cup titles. They 
have won four Olympic Gold Medals. But despite all of their success, 
they are not immune from the pervasive wage gap. In fact, on average as 
players, they earn four times less than their male counterparts. It is 
not just about the men. Think about the message the wage gap sends to 
young girls who see women valued less than men for doing the same work 
and, in the case of the women's soccer team, doing it so much better.
  I am glad members of the women's national soccer team are taking a 
stand to gain equal pay for the work they do. In the Senate, we are 
going to keep championing the Paycheck Fairness Act to make equal pay a 
reality for women across the country. I look forward to an Equal Pay 
Day in the future that we can actually celebrate, once we finally 
achieve pay equity regardless of gender.
  Until then, my colleagues and I are going to keep fighting on behalf 
of all women and families until they get the equal pay they have 
earned.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
  Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I am very pleased to be here with both 
of the Senators from Washington, one of the few States that have two 
Senators who are women. It is great to be here with both of them. I 
would also like to thank Senator Barbara Mikulski for leading the 
effort for the Paycheck Fairness Act. She is the longest serving woman 
in congressional history. She has opened many doors for all of us.
  When she first wrote her book about women in the Senate, it was 
called ``Nine and Counting.'' Well, today, our count is even higher, as 
there are 20 women in the Senate. She was the first woman--Barbara 
Mikulski was--to chair the Senate Appropriations Committee. Because of 
her groundbreaking work in this Congress, 10 committees have either a 
chair or a ranking member who is a woman.
  Today, as the presiding officer knows, President Obama formally 
dedicated a new national monument to

[[Page 3953]]

honor women's suffrage and equal rights. I am a cosponsor of the bill 
to have the Sewall-Belmont House named as a national historical site. 
The Belmont-Paul Women's Equality National Monument is named after 
Alice Paul and Alva Belmont, two leaders of the National Woman's Party. 
It will house an extensive collection that documents the history of the 
movement for women's equality.
  What has happened in the last decade or so? Well, in 2009, we passed 
the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act to make sure that workers who face pay 
discrimination based on gender, race, age, religion, disability, or 
national origin have access to the courts. In doing so, we restored the 
original intent of the Civil Rights Act and the Equal Pay Act.
  Now it is time to prevent that pay discrimination from happening in 
the first place. We all know women have made big strides in our country 
and in our economy over the last few decades. Women are getting 
advanced degrees. They are starting new businesses. The Fortune 500 now 
has 20 women CEOs. That does not sound like much, but when you look 
back just a few decades, there were not any.
  Yet, despite all of the progress we have made and all of the gaps 
that we are starting to close, women in this country still earn only 
around 80 cents for every dollar a man makes. When two-thirds of 
today's families rely all or in part on the mother's income--and in 
about 40 percent of families the mother is, in fact, the main bread 
winner--this pay gap has real consequences for American families and 
our entire economy.
  I wanted to focus on one issue at the end here, and that is 
retirement savings, which is maybe not the first thing you would think 
about when you think about a pay gap. It is probably not what our young 
pages think about. They don't think: Well, what about the retirement 
gap? But, in fact, it is something everyone should be thinking about.
  When I was the Senate chair of the Joint Economic Committee, I 
released a report showing how equal pay affects women's financial 
security. The report showed that lower wages impact women all 
throughout their working lives, and these lower lifetime earnings 
translate to less security in retirement.
  According to the JEC report, the average annual income for women age 
65 and older, including pensions, private savings, and Social Security, 
is $11,000 less than it is for men. Social Security retirement benefits 
are based on a person's lifetime earnings. The average monthly benefit 
for female retirees is 77 percent less. The same thing goes for 
pensions. A woman's pension income is 53 percent that of men. Women 
also receive smaller pension checks from Federal, State, and local 
government pension plans.
  Finally, a recent study showed that the average woman was able to 
save less than half of what the average man was able to save in an IRA. 
So what we have here is, first of all, women are making less to begin 
with. That is what we are talking about today. That means they save 
less and have less money in Social Security. Secondly, they live 
longer. That is great, but it means they are going to have less money. 
Then, finally, we have the fact that they are often a single 
breadwinner in 40 percent of households. The fact that they take time 
off often to have children--that is the third factor that leads to less 
savings.
  What we should be doing is looking at how we can address the savings 
gap. There are ways we can address it by making it easier to save and 
making it easier to set up 401(k)s and IRAs and looking at the 
millennials and how we can respond to what is an increasingly different 
economy for young people. But we also can simply make sure women make 
the same amount as men when they do the same job.
  It was the late Paul Wellstone of my State who famously said: ``We 
all do better when we all do better.'' I still believe that is true 
today and so do my colleagues who join me. We need to be focused on how 
we can help more women share in our economic growth and share in the 
American dream. I ask my colleagues to support and pass the Paycheck 
Fairness Act.
  I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for up 
to 5 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. President, I come to the floor with my colleague 
from Minnesota and my colleague Senator Murray from Washington, along 
with our other colleagues who have already been here to speak about the 
important issue of paycheck fairness.
  It is truly shameful this kind of discrimination still exists. We 
have heard the statistics about what the pay gap means, but literally 
over someone's career--over a 40-year career--a woman in my state could 
lose as much as $500,000 in income. An Asian American woman could lose 
$700,000 over a 40-year career and a Native American woman could lose 
as much as $900,000 over the same time period. So, yes, when women are 
discriminated against, it costs them and their families.
  The gender pay gap issue is a family issue. Women are breadwinners 
too. Women today still earn only 79 cents for every $1 paid to a man. 
This means less food on the table, less money to buy clothing for their 
children, or less money for insurance premiums. What we need to do is 
make sure we are listening to these stories and taking action.
  Here is a story from one of my constituents, Adrianna, from Olympia. 
She said:

       In 1993, when I was in college, I was working at a 
     restaurant. . . . This job enabled me to pay my way through 
     school with no student loans. A young man several years 
     younger than me with less experience was making a larger wage 
     and I found out about it. I politely confronted the owner as 
     to why this fellow was making more money than me. The owner 
     was caught off guard and could give me no reason whatsoever. 
     . . . The thing that really stuck in my craw was that the 
     young man told me he only worked there so he could get money 
     to gamble. . . . Of course, I had no other choice and worked 
     7 days a week for 5 years to get a Bachelor's degree.

  Unfortunately, this story isn't unique. Wage discrimination affects a 
wide range of professional fields, including realtors, educators, 
administrators, and even CEOs. For example, male surgeons earn 37 
percent more per week than their female counterparts. In real terms, 
that female surgeon earns $756 less per week than her male colleagues, 
and this adds up. And this does not apply only to high-paying, male-
dominated careers: Women are 94.6 percent of all secretaries and 
administrative assistants. Yet they still earn only 84 percent of what 
their male counterparts earn per week.
  My colleague Senator Murray brought up the U.S. Women's National 
Soccer Team that helped bring this issue to the forefront. Despite 
being more successful and attracting more viewers than the men's team, 
the U.S. women's soccer team still is paid 25 percent less than the 
men's team.
  In fact, one of my constituents last week--an 11-year-old girl soccer 
player from Washington--asked: If I keep playing sports, am I going to 
get fair pay?
  Young women are asking us to do our job and make sure we pass 
legislation that helps. That is why we commend Senator Mikulski for 
introducing the Paycheck Fairness Act and for her tireless efforts on 
this legislation. I am proud to be one of its cosponsors.
  The Paycheck Fairness Act requires that pay be job related and not 
discriminate based on gender. It would strengthen the penalties for 
discrimination and give women the tools they need to identify and 
confront unfair treatment. It would make sure we recognize women are 
breadwinners, too, and that they get the equal pay they deserve.
  That is why my colleagues are coming to the floor today to say we 
should pass this bill this year. We don't need to commemorate another 
day of what women have done for our country; women need to receive 
equal pay for the equal work they are doing. I thank my colleagues for 
helping to bring attention to this issue, and I encourage the passage 
of this legislation.

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  With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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