Posted on 01/29/2009 8:10:59 AM PST by Joiseydude
President Obama signed his first bill on Thursday, an equal-pay measure that makes it easier for workers to sue for discrimination on the job.
The Lilly Ledbetter bill extends the period an employee can file a claim of discrimination for making less money than another worker doing the same job.
"That there are no second class citizens in our workplaces, and that it's not just unfair and illegal -- but bad for business-- to pay someone less because of their gender, age, race, ethnicity, religion or disability," he said before a packed East Room audience.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
IIRC Obama was paying his female campaign workers about 75% of what the male campaign workers were making.
Yes - as when Bill Clinton got his winkie caught in a bear trap of his own making. :-)
Barack Obama has campaigned on the issue of “equal pay”, casting John McCain as a villain for not supporting federal legislation widening grounds and timing for pay-discrimination lawsuits. Yet Obama may have a fair-pay issue of his own. According to Fred Lucas at Cybercast News Service, women on his staff made $6,000 less than men on average. McCain, on the other hand, has more women in key positions — and the women on his staff average slightly higher salaries than the men:
On average, women working in Obama’s Senate office were paid at least $6,000 below the average man working for the Illinois senator. That’s according to data calculated from the Report of the Secretary of the Senate, which covered the six-month period ending Sept. 30, 2007. Of the five people in Obama’s Senate office who were paid $100,000 or more on an annual basis, only one — Obama’s administrative manager — was a woman.
The average pay for the 33 men on Obama’s staff (who earned more than $23,000, the lowest annual salary paid for non-intern employees) was $59,207. The average pay for the 31 women on Obama’s staff who earned more than $23,000 per year was $48,729.91. (The average pay for all 36 male employees on Obama’s staff was $55,962; and the average pay for all 31 female employees was $48,729. The report indicated that Obama had only one paid intern during the period, who was a male.)
McCain, an Arizona senator, employed a total of 69 people during the reporting period ending in the fall of 2007, but 23 of them were interns. Of his non-intern employees, 30 were women and 16 were men. After excluding interns, the average pay for the 30 women on McCain’s staff was $59,104.51. The 16 non-intern males in McCain’s office, by comparison, were paid an average of $56,628.83.
First, one has to ask why Obama has 64 non-intern staffers while McCain has 46. Obama doesn’t chair any committees, and the subcommittee he chairs has not exactly had a prodigious output. The difference in salaries comes to almost a million dollars a year. What exactly is the value that taxpayers have received for this extra assistance? Obama has a negligible legislative record for his three years in the Senate, and has spent most of the last two years running for President, as has McCain, who managed to get by with much less.
If CNS has its figures correct, then Obama has some explaining to do. CNS has not always been terribly reliable, but in this instance, it’s not difficult to get the correct figures on staffers and salary; they’re matters of public record. CNS has managed to do what other media outlets have overlooked, which is to match Obama’s rhetoric with his hiring record.
Obama wants to have women get paid on an equal basis as men, which makes sense to me. He should start with himself rather than siccing the federal government on the private sector. As with change, clean politics, and leadership, Obama talks the talk while McCain walks the walk.
Translation:
“Equal pay for the stupid and lazy, or our trial lawyers will be on your case.”
This screwball is about the dimmest light bulb on planet Earth. No wonder businesses are moving overseas. It may sound good, but what is prevent an employee from laying off the lower paid person and spread the work load around with what is left. And this is what will happen. Then the “O Wise One” will place another bill preventing laying of any employee without consulting another branch of Government which will be called “Can’t Fire Employees”. We are going to shi@ fast.
Does any one know the restrictions?
I believe its a cap of 300k and is limited to just a few years.
The school systems are going to wet themselves. They are the worst for doing this. I bet they were exempt.
At least the lawyers got their bailout! But this is no stupider than the ADA legislation championed by Bush #41 and Bob Dole.
He will get sued for wages owed if true
Most companies will not tell one worker what another is getting and strongly "urge" workers not to discuss salaries.
Will they now have to post on a bulletin board or something everyone's pay?
This is another tactic that will hurt the worker. The company will keep everyone's pay low but equal now to avoid lawsuits.
Man, in one week the Obama Administration and his Dem buds are signing laws and spending money left and right like they just won the lottery.
Could they take a little break and let the rest of us come up for air????
It’s limited to the 18 month period from the date of your last paycheck.
well, this is really bad for employees. Now companies will not reward the better employees with higher wages.
Is it just me or does this bill really not do anything?
Read it again. It seems all it does is lengthen the time that you can sue. You can already sue for that
“The Bill exempts campaign workers!” Obama exclaimed. /sarcasm
ALL employees will wind up getting paid only an amount equal to the value of the dumbest sob there!
Just like unions but without union contracts and strikes.
"...Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign pays his own female Senate staffers, on average, only 78 percent of what he pays male staffers."
Don't do as I do...do as I say.
I'll have to read the devil in the details but it seems that salary negotiations are now moot, if not illegal. There will only be collective salary bargaining which means this is really a union-creating law.
The easier and more cost efficient way for a company to handle this is make the pay rates all equal but lower. And lay off more workers. Eliminate merit raises as they have the potential of a lawsuit. For instance, Bill does a bang up job as a technician, hardly ever calls off sick, doesn't cause a lot of trouble. A good worker. Sally, also a technician, on the other hand, wastes a lot of the day gossiping with other workers, calls off sick at least once a month and is demanding.
Bill should get good merit increases because he earned them. But if Sally finds out he makes more than her, she files a lawsuit. Maybe doesn't win, but it costs the company to handle this PIA. Solution 1 - when Bill gets a raise, Sally gets the raise also - equal amount.
Solution 2 - only give cost of living raises every 3-4 years. Sally keeps calling off sick; Bill starts not to give a sh!t about his job and when there's a layoff, he goes because if they let Sally go, she'd file another lawsuit. Plus the company can tell Bill we laid you off because your job performance went from a great employee to crap.
Human Resources 101 in the 21st century.
The Devil is always in the Details.
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