Governor Brown has indicated that he will be signing a new bill passed by the California Legislature that will help women yet again overcome the obstacles of inequality. The Expanded Fair Pay bill will give women the right to know what their male counterparts are earning when performing the same task at work. According to an article on Mercury News, full-time female workers in California earn 84 cents for every dollar a man makes, losing out on around $33 billion a year.
Women have continued to to fight for their rights since the Suffrage movement starting in 1840. They didn’t get the right to vote until 1920, when three quarters of the states legislature ratified the 19th Amendment. It wasn’t until 1963 that the Equal Pay Act became a federal law, stating that employers must give equal pay for men and women performing the same job of race, color, religion, origin, or sex. In 1973, the Supreme Court established the right for a woman to be in charge of their reproductive rights. That same year, women-only branches in the United Stated Military were eliminated. The most recent victory in women’s rights would be the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act which was signed into law in 2009.
“I have friends who make a little less than their male counterparts,” said Karsen Kehlet, a Sierra College student. “I feel that society is starting to shift in a way that women can actually voice their opinion and get some of those issues conquered.”
Locally, organizations such as Girls on the Rise are helping young women continue the fight by allowing them to become leaders in their own communities.
This law is set to start on January 1st, 2016
