“Maybe 23 cents doesn’t sound like a lot to someone with a Swiss bank account, Cayman Island Investments and an IRA worth tens of millions of dollars. But Governor Romney, when we lose 23 cents every hour, every day, every paycheck, every job, over our entire lives, what we lose can’t just be measured in dollars.”
~Lilly Ledbetter
Pretty powerful speech from Lilly Ledbetter at the Democratic National Convention; if you want to read her story – go HERE.
Ask yourself how conservatives are against women getting paid the same as men. Women make .77 cents for every $1 a man makes for the same job; women are paid 23% less. But conservatives are blocking the ability for women to achieve equal pay and it is unconscionable. It is interesting to watch conservatives say they care about women and then tell them they have to keep the babies of their rapists and actively voting against women having equal pay; no – I’m not being hyperbolic. Deeds > Words.
The very first bill that President Obama put forward was the S 181 Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009. The law says that if a woman finds out that she has been discriminated against for being a woman regarding her pay – she will have the recourse to take the employer to court regardless of how long ago it happened. Previously – there was a 6 month limit, but as Lilly Ledbetter acknowledged … she didn’t find out about the pay discrimination for nearly two decades.
For those of you who don’t remember the very first vote Republicans took for an item on President Obama’s agenda …. 173 House Republicans voted against this bill and only 3 voted for it (source). All that bill did was eliminate the 6 month timeframe.
Republicans have been trying to block pay equity for women for quite some time. This year – Democrats tried to build on the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009. Even though Democrats has 52 votes in the Senate – a majority – Republicans blocked the “Paycheck Fairness Act” which would have put the responsibility on companies to prove there was merit in paying women less than men for the same type of job. Every single Republican in the Senate voted against fair pay for women (source). We’ve explained more on this bill HERE.
And when a reporter asked in April of 2012, “Does Governor Romney support the Lilly Ledbetter Act?” …. their response:
“We’ll get back to you on that.”
Hear it yourself HERE.
