Effort to Achieve Pay Equity for Women Launched in CT

Increasingly, it appears that we are in the midst of an era when longstanding inequities are becoming the focus of attention, with advocates driving what they hope will be long overdue systemic change.

The latest such initiative is being launched by the nonprofit Permanent Commission on the Status of Women in Connecticut (the “PCSW”) - a multi-part media campaign entitled PCSW Let’s Talk: Pay Equity - A Bipartisan Conversation Based on the Facts.   The series explores the gender wage gap in depth, with the first episode examining the difference between the terms “Pay Equity” and “Equal Pay for Equal Work”.

Subsequent episodes will address topics such as the federal and state legislative framework on this issue, systemic factors contributing to the pay gap, the long term effects of a gender pay gap, research related to the effect of pay equity on corporate profitability, and corporate best practices that address the pay gap, to name a few.

According to the American Community Survey (“ACS”) from the United States Census Bureau, in 2018 the median annual income of all full-time working men in the U.S. was $52,004 while the median income of all full-time working women was $42,238. This constitutes a wage gap of $9,766, with women as a group earning 82 cents for every dollar earned by men.

The 2018 ACS also provides data demonstrating that in Connecticut, women earn 84 cents for every dollar earned by men. However, Black and Latinx/Hispanic women are disproportionately affected, with these women earning 57 cents and 48 cents on the dollar, respectively, compared to Connecticut’s men.

This pay equity metric involves comparing men and women across job categories, and does not account for the fact that men, on average, hold higher paying jobs. However, as the video further demonstrates, even when comparing pay for equal work across genders, the wage gap persists.

Tina Courpas, Executive Director of the PCSW, points out that “Pay equity is a foundational issue for women and for all people, as it drives their economic security. Women’s economic security, or lack thereof, is an important factor affecting women’s vulnerability to problems such as domestic violence and sexual assault, and lack of access to adequate healthcare, housing, and education.”

The video series will be data-driven, research-based, and is available in English and Spanish.

“The pay equity issue is nuanced, and these nuances matter to the discussion. We hope to take the discussion to a deeper level with this series, as we believe that with greater understanding, we can help support real, workable, bipartisan solutions,” Courpas added.

The original PCSW (the “Commission”) was formed as a state agency in 1973 and for 43 years, developed landmark legislation, research, and initiatives in the areas of sexual harassment, domestic violence, family medical leave, pay equity, and human trafficking to improve the lives of women and girls in Connecticut. In 2016, the legislature merged the Commission with several other state agencies.

The PCSW was re-constituted through two private non-profit corporations, which together constitute the PCSW today. Throughout their collective 47-year history, the Commission was, and the PCSW today remains, a bipartisan organization with a non-partisan mandate, reflecting the broad diversity of Connecticut’s women.

According to Courpas, the PCSW Let’s Talk video campaign is “substantive, yet highly accessible. We hope it will be interesting and useful to legislators, students, employees, employers, and all our citizens.”

The series can be seen at The PCSW website at www.pcswct.org, or on youtube.