Today, April 8, 2014, the White House hosted a press conference in honor of Equal Pay Day. Equal Pay Day symbolizes how far into 2014 women must work to earn what men earned in 2013, based on national pay averages. Lilly Ledbetter, the namesake of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act that was signed by President Obama in 2009, kicked-off the festivities by speaking about her experiences at Goodyear Tire.
After a speech highlighting the pay gap, President Obama then signed the Executive Order prohibiting federal contractors from retaliating against employees who discuss their pay with each other. Furthermore, he is issuing a Presidential Memorandum instructing the Secretary of Labor to establish new regulations requiring federal contractors to submit summary compensation data by sex and race. According to the official White House Blog, this “will help employers take proactive efforts to ensure fair pay for all their employees.” The President further called on Congress to vote “yes” for the Paycheck Fairness Act later this week. Please find the links for the Executive Order, Memo, and Fact Sheet below:
By: Joanna Colosimo, M.A., and David Morgan, M.S., Senior Consultants at DCI Consulting Group
