{"id":11077,"date":"2016-03-21T07:29:27","date_gmt":"2016-03-21T13:29:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/?p=11077"},"modified":"2016-03-21T07:29:27","modified_gmt":"2016-03-21T13:29:27","slug":"montana-ethic-project-on-equal-pay-for-equal-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2016\/03\/montana-ethic-project-on-equal-pay-for-equal-work\/","title":{"rendered":"Montana Ethic Project: On equal pay for equal work"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Wilmer\"<\/a>

Joey and Libbie Early<\/p>

Franke Wilmer, a former state representative, talks about “Gender Equity” in this chapter of “The Montana Ethic Project.”<\/p><\/div>\n

This is the third chapter of the 32-part video series \u201cThe Montana Ethic Project.\u201d This chapter features Franke Wilmer, a former state representative, former chair of the Montana Human Rights Commission and a political science professor at Montana State University, speaking on “Gender Equity.” You can watch the whole video below. Here is how it opens:<\/em><\/p>\n

“I have worked on human rights for the last 20 years at Montana State University and have also chaired\u00a0the Montana Human Rights Commission. It\u2019s what got me interested in public service full time. … \u00a0I want to talk about something I\u2019ve worked on more recently, that is women\u2019s rights more broadly,\u00a0in particular the equal pay for equal work issue, which has been on the public policy agenda, both\u00a0federally and locally, since 1963 when President Kennedy signed into law the first equal pay act.”<\/p>\n

Here is another, edited excerpt from Wilmer’s\u00a0presentation:\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

“It\u2019s important because in 60 percent of Montana families, 31 percent are headed by women, 27 percent\u00a0depend on a woman\u2019s income, so about 60 percent of Montana families depend on the income earned\u00a0by women. If they\u2019re not being paid fairly, the families are not receiving the income that they should\u00a0equitably receive. They\u2019re being deprived of income they should be earning, that one of the family\u00a0members, one of the parents, should be earning.<\/p>\n

“And everything about the family\u2019s condition, from prospects to being able to pay their children\u2019s tuition\u00a0to college to being able to afford health insurance, is being affected by that pay loss. Nationwide,\u00a0women are paid about 77 percent of what men make, which means about 77 cents of the dollar. About\u00a023 percent of income women are being deprived of. Montana, unfortunately, is a little bit lower\u201470\u00a0percent. And for Native American women, we have a 6\u00a0percent Native American population, and for\u00a0Native American women providing for their families its 58 percent.<\/p>\n

“So they make 58 cents of the dollar for the same work.”<\/p>\n