Free Republic

If you would understand why America has lost the dynamism she had in the 1950s and 1960s, consider the new Paycheck Fairness Act passed by the House 256 to 162. The need for such a law, writes Valerie Jarrett, the ranking woman in Barack Obama's White House, is that "working women are still paid only 77 cents for every dollar earned by a man." But why is that a concern of the U.S. government, and where is the empirical evidence that an inequality of pay between the sexes is proof of sexist hostility to women? On average, Asians earn more...

AMONG the top items left on the Senate’s to-do list before the November elections is a “paycheck fairness” bill, which would make it easier for women to file class-action, punitive-damages suits against employers they accuse of sex-based pay discrimination. The bill’s passage is hardly certain, but it has received strong support from women’s rights groups, professional organizations and even President Obama, who has called it “a common-sense bill.” But the bill isn’t as commonsensical as it might seem. It overlooks mountains of research showing that discrimination plays little role in pay disparities between men and women, and it threatens to...

America first put an equal-pay law on the books in 1963, when women earned 59 cents for every dollar earned by a man. While this legislation was landmark at the time, its core provisions require updating if it is to fulfill its promise. Nearly 50 years later, the wage gap has narrowed by only 18 cents. Despite news reports that the gap narrowed in the last year, the census report released Thursday showed otherwise. Working women are still paid only 77 cents for every dollar earned by a man -- and are paid less than men even when they have...