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Through my research, I have concluded that the wage gap exists for three reasons. These reasons, working sepera tely or in conjunction, hold down people in accordance to their race or gender. Two of the three reasons can be eliminated by simply informing people of their rights and the reality of the wage gap. Please share my page so that we can spread the word and help fix this problem. The wage gap has existed for too long because of the following reasons:

 

1. "The wage gap is a tradition" - Since the United States became a country, the core of the working class was the white males. Hispanics, African-Americans, and women were seen as unfit to work for wages, or were put into lower level employement. The tradition of this, along with the ever-lasting effects of racism and discrimination, created the gap of compensation when Hispanics and African-Americans entered the workforce in great numbers during the early 20th century. Though the United States attempted to eradicate discrimination in their personal labor force and contractors until the 1960s, the wage gap survived. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was an attempt to equalize all groups - except for women at the time - and Title VII of the Act addressed fair compensation of all workers. This overall solution was successful and unsuccessful. It succeeded in setting the standard for all wage gap legislation for the future and providing a basis for an ultimate solution. Unfortunately, there were, and still are, many loopholes and exceptions that can be found in the Civil Rights Act that still allow employers to legally underpay certain racial groups. These legal shortcomings, along with the tradition of seeing white males as superior to other racial groups and viewing women as inferior to men, has fueled the tradition of the wage gap.

 

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Take a second to notice one thing: two of those three factors rely soley on the employee. This puts a great multitude of the responsibility on the employee to take action and earn his/her fair wages. Although legislation is in place to ensure that employers are fair, it lies upon the person to seek the payment they deserve. By spreading the word, people become motivated to see if they are being paid correctly and, if not, fight for waht they deserve. By spreading the word, a Hispanic woman - the lowest paid group - can be paid as much as an Asian American male: over 75% more. An average woman can make a dollar for every dollar a male makes. Equal Pay Day (the day the average woman would have to work until to achieve the same compensation the average male made in the last year) is currently April 8th. Equal Pay Day should not exist because women should not have to work more hours, more days, more weeks to achieve the payment they deserve. There is good news, though. The wage gap is closing, slowly, but regardlessly, closing. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately, I will be over 60 years old when this is projected to happen, and most of the labor force today will either not live to see this happen or be retired when it does. The generation of technology and social networking can act as a catalyst to this change, spreading the word and closing the gap much, much quicker. The graph above also shows that legislation does not necessarily close the gap, as you can see in the years where major acts were released (1964, 1991, 2009), and the subsequent years, there is little increase.  Spreading the word and informing the working class is what is closing the wage gap.