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Western Union Telegraph Company Strike
Communications across the country ground to a halt when the majority of the workers for Western Union Telegraph Company went on strike, partly to ensure "equal pay for equal work" for its male and female employees. Although the strike wasn't successful, it became one of the earliest public demands for fair pay for women. -
Teachers Get Equal Pay
New York female teachers were finally granted pay equal to male teachers, after a long and contentious battle with the Board of Education. -
WWI
The Assistant Director of the U.S. Employment Services said "When the lists have been prepared...it is believed that the force of public opinion and self-respect will prevent any able-bodied man from keeping a position officially designated as 'woman's work'." National War Labor Board decided they should be paid the same: "If it shall become necessary to employ women on work ordinarily performed by men, they must be allowed equal pay for equal work." -
WWII
Many American women were taking on jobs in the war industries while men were overseas, so the National Labor Board urged employers to voluntarily make “adjustments which equalize wage or salary rates paid to females with the rates paid to males for comparable quality and quantity of work on the same or similar operations.” Employers did not comply, and pushed the women out of their jobs when the men returned home. -
Equal Pay for Private Sector
Secretary of Labor Lewis Schwellenbach tried to get an equal pay amendment passed that would apply to the private sector, arguing, "There is no sex difference in the food she buys or the rent she pays, there should be none in her pay envelope." But as veterans needed work after the war and women were increasingly expected to stay in the home, Schwellenbach's bid was ultimately unsuccessful. -
Equal Pay Act
JFK passes equal Pay Act was passed to make it illegal to pay women lower rates for the same job strictly on the basis of their sex. -
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Back Wages Increase
Gradually expanded back wages totaling more than $26 million were paid to 71,000 women. -
Johnson's Executive Order
President Lyndon B. Johnson makes and executive order for all establishments to provide equal employment opportunities to men and women. It required federal contractors to "take affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed and that employees are treated during employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, or national origin." -
Schultz v. Wheaton Glass Co. (U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit)
This court case ruled that jobs need to be “substantially equal” but not “identical” to fall under the protection of the Equal Pay Act. For example, an employer cannot change the jobs titles of women workers in order to pay them less than men. -
Corning Glass Works v. Brennan (U.S. Supreme Court)
This U.S. Supreme Court case ruled that employers cannot justify paying women less because that’s what they traditionally received under the going market rate. It ruled that a wage differential occuring simply because men would not work at the low rates paid women was unacceptable. -
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Rapid Wage Gap Reduction
This decade contained the most rapid rate of reduction in wage gap. The median annual wage and salary earnings of full-time, full-year women who worked rose from 60% of men’s earnings in 1979 to 69% only a decade later. The speed of this increased was faster than in the 1990’s and 2000’s.This was due to the increase in women who achieved college degrees and obtaining professional degrees and women entered higher paying fields. -
Equal Pay Day
Originated by the National Committee on Pay Equity (NCPE). It was created as a public awareness event to show the gap between men’s and women’s wages. -
Obama Signs Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act
Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Restoration Act allows victims of pay discrimination to file a complaint with the government against their employer within 180 days of their last paycheck.
