Healthy Families Act Reintroduced in Congress

Millions of Americans working without paid sick days face the impossible choice between caring for their health and that of their family, and keeping their paycheck or job. At a time when many families are worried about their financial security, the threat of losing a job or needed wages forces many workers to go to their jobs even though they are ill.

The lack of paid sick days poses a risk to public health. Many of the workers without paid sick days are in food service and health care jobs where illness can be spread to those they work with and serve.

Laura Baker, a barista at a Denver Starbucks, says the company does not offer her paid sick leave. She says that puts others at risk because she is forced to go to work sick in order to make enough money to cover rent.

"We exchange cash with you, make your latte, hand you your pastry, and yes, we sneeze," Baker says. "So if an employee had to come to work with the flu because she couldn't afford to miss work, you might be walking out of the store with your double latte and the flu."

But the lack of paid sick days is more than just a public health crisis – it is an economic crisis. As hard-working Americans are fired for being sick, they add to the growing unemployment rates and keep our economic recovery from moving forward.

“My daughter, who was eight months pregnant, had an asthma attack at work,” says Rhonda Willette, of Milwaukee 9to5 . “She’d been on the job five months, but she didn’t qualify for leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act. When she returned to work three days later with a medical statement, she was fired. No one would hire her at eight months pregnant. She became homeless. If she’d had paid sick days, my daughter would have kept her job and her income.”

There is a solution.

The Healthy Families Act, introduced last week by Congresswoman DeLauro (D-CT) and Senator Harkin (D-IA), will allow workers to earn up to seven paid sick days a year to recover from illness, access preventive care or look after a sick child or other family members.

This modest amount of sick leave will have a huge impact on millions of workers across the country, allowing them to take care of themselves and their loved ones when they are sick – without the fear of losing their jobs or needed wages.

And paid sick days will help workers without hurting business. In San Francisco and Washington, DC, where laws have already been enacted, studies have shown that workers are not only healthier but more productive when they have access to paid sick days. Six in seven employers surveyed in San Francisco say that paid sick days have had no negative effect on profitability, and two-thirds of employers support the law.

“Paid sick day policies are good for public health, for families, for workers and for businesses, too,” says Erin Bennett, Colorado Director of 9to5. In order to strengthen jobs and the economy, safeguard public health and protect working families, we need paid sick days – and we need the Healthy Families Act.

Paycheck Fairness Now!

On April 12, 2011, the nation observes Equal Pay Day to symbolize that women have to work a year plus more than three months to equal what men make in just one year, on average. This past year women were paid 77 cents for every dollar paid to men in the U.S. For women of color, the gap is even wider, with African American women earning 67 cents and Latinas 58 cents on the dollar.

9to5 member LaTerrell Bradford calls equal pay a “non-negotiable.” While working as part of an all-female support team, a man was hired in the same job classification. Her female supervisor discovered that he was to earn much more than any of the women and advocated for every team member to be paid at the higher rate. Human resources relented because as Bradford says, “It would not have been fair nor legal to sit next to him, do the exact same work and have him be paid more.”

Not only is the pay gap unfair, it harms families and children. Recent 2009 statistics show the largest number of people, including children, living in poverty since those numbers have been measured, and adult women 32% more likely to be poor than adult men. Women’s paychecks put food on the table and pay for doctor visits for sick children. With women as the sole or co-breadwinner in more families than ever, equal pay is critical.

9to5 member and former Wal-Mart employee Mary Henderson is among the original plaintiffs of a massive gender discrimination class-action lawsuit against Wal-Mart heard by the U.S. Supreme Court in late March. Mary was paid thousands of dollars less than a man with less education and the same seniority in the same position. Mary’s daughter, also a Wal-Mart employee, applied for a supervisory job that ended up going to a man because “he had a family to support” – even though she was supporting her family, too. When Mary inquired about these instances of gender pay discrimination, she was punished with transfer to a store requiring an hours-long commute.

The pay gap is evident in almost every occupational category, in every income bracket; it’s a constant despite education, despite experience. The National Women’s Law Center found the gap represents $10,622 a year, with which a family could:

• Buy a year’s worth of groceries ($3,210)
• Arrange for three months of childcare ($1,748)
• Pay three months of rent and utilities ($2,265)
• Cover six months of health insurance ($1,697)
• Pay down six months on a student loan ($1,602) AND
• Purchase three full tanks of gas ($100)

The Equal Pay Act was signed in 1963 to address the pay disparity that was 59 cents for women working full-time year-round jobs as compared to men’s one dollar of pay at that time. Since then the wage gap has narrowed by less than one-half of one cent per year. At this rate, women won’t achieve equality for 66 years, in 2077!

The Paycheck Fairness Act will be an important step to help end significant and persistent disparities in pay, as it updates the Equal Pay Act of 1963, strengthens penalties courts may impose for violations of existing equal pay laws, prohibits retaliation against workers who inquire about or share wage information and empowers women to better negotiate for equal pay. It must be passed for the women of today and for the women of tomorrow.

The U.S. Congress must consider how the pay gap places families of today in jeopardy, especially in these tough economic times. They should think about how they love and value their own daughters, granddaughters, and great-granddaughters. Are they really worth less than their sons, grandsons and great-grandsons?

Of course not! Equality is the cornerstone of our American way of life. Let’s all urge U. S. Senators and Representatives to champion fair pay for America’s working women and sign on as co-sponsors of the Paycheck Fairness Act as it is re-introduced this year. It’s the right thing to do for women, families and our country.

-Linda Meric, 9to5 Executive Director

Arizona-Style Laws An Attack on Women and Children

In response to frustration with the federal government’s lack of a coherent immigration policy, state legislatures across the country are considering several Arizona-style immigration bills to require or allow law enforcement officers to demand proof of immigration status from anyone they suspect of being in the country illegally. Although the well-being of women and children isn’t usually the first thing that springs to mind as an immigration issue, the reality is that these types of laws put women and children in harm’s way.

Officers could be forced to interrogate all brown-skinned people, anyone speaking in accented English or Spanish – most of whom will be American citizens or legal residents. The courts are currently reviewing the constitutionality of potentially institutionalizing racial profiling, largely blocking sections of the original Arizona law from enforcement.

Regardless of how you feel about these laws, the truth is that women and children are the ones who have the most to lose if these bills pass. Families will be torn apart, children will be traumatized, domestic violence survivors will be silenced and workplace abuse will increase. Furthermore, these bills will undermine public safety for all of us.

Tearing Families Apart: Traffic cops targeting drivers for potential deportation means mothers are taken away from their children – often children who are U.S. citizens – splitting up families in pursuit of enforcement of a broken immigration system. A mother dropping her children off at school or child care in the morning doesn’t know if she’ll be there to pick them up in the afternoon. Children have been separated from parents who are detained and eventually deported; others have been removed from their parents’ homes and placed in foster care. These families endure harsh economic and emotional hardship.

Traumatizing Children: Children experience severe psychological trauma when separated from their primary caretakers. A 2010 Urban Institute report documented this: “The vast majority of children whose parents were detained in ICE raids in the workplace and in the home exhibited multiple behavioral changes in the aftermath of parental detention, including anxiety, frequent crying, changes in eating and sleeping patterns, withdrawal and anger…Disturbingly, the children also experienced dramatic increases in housing instability and food insecurity, which are both dimensions of basic well-being.”

In a Congressional hearing, 11 year-old Heidi Ruby Portugal described her reaction after her mother was seized in Arizona, “They took away the most precious thing that children have, our mother. With one hit they took away my smile and my happiness.”

Silencing Survivors of Domestic Violence: These laws actually increase the threat to women facing domestic violence or sexual assault. Domestic violence survivors will be reluctant to call the police for fear of deportation, sometimes leading to fatal consequences. Survivors of sexual assault will avoid hospitals and services, fearing the involvement of the police. This is particularly dangerous for immigrant women who already face so many barriers, including language access and cultural stigmas that may make it less likely that they will seek services.

Discriminating Against Women in the Workplace: Abusive employers who violate wage, sexual harassment and discrimination laws – laws that protect everyone who works in our country – will benefit from these measures. Immigrant women will be vulnerable to employers using the threat of deportation to control and exploit them professionally and sexually. An Arizona-style law will silence women from speaking out, from reporting crimes and violations of workplace rights.

Undermining of Public Safety: Most police chiefs and law enforcement experts agree that public safety is hurt when trust between immigrant communities and the police is replaced by fear. If police participate in immigration enforcement programs, crime victims and witnesses will be unwilling to come forward and report crime. This makes the entire community less safe.

Our immigration system is clearly not working but our time is far better spent promoting policies that help position ALL women and families to live the American dream, like policies to help close the pay gap so women can support their children now and prepare for an economically secure retirement tomorrow, and workplace standards like paid sick days that protect jobs and income for workers when faced with illness, domestic violence and sexual assault. Let’s not pass laws that attack women and children.

-Linda Meric, 9to5 Executive Director

Stop Wal-Mart From Discriminating Against Women

LINDA MERIC and MARY HENDERSON

Ten years after Betty Dukes and other women workers first brought their claims of sex discrimination in pay and promotions against Wal-Mart, their case will go before the Supreme Court on March 29. 1.6 million women currently and formerly employed at Wal-Mart will be affected by the Court’s determination on whether Wal-Mart’s female employees can join together as a class, to challenge company-wide discrimination. The fair-minded among us will agree that Dukes v. Wal-Mart should be a class action case.

These patterns of discrimination catalogued in the lawsuit are exemplified in the experience of Mary, a 9to5 member and former Wal-Mart worker, who questioned why she was paid thousands of dollars less than a man with less education and the same seniority in the same position. Mary’s daughter, also a Wal-Mart employee, applied for a supervisory job that ended up going to a man because “he had a family to support” – even though she was supporting her family, as well. When Mary inquired about this, she was punished with transfer to a store requiring an hours-long commute.

The case contains thousands of pages of disturbing evidence documenting pervasive gender stereotypes, statistical pay and promotion disparities, and policies that allowed those stereotypes to negatively influence employment decisions affecting women throughout the company. A few examples:

Gender Stereotypes. The documents reveal an ingrained corporate culture that views women as inferior to men, and not interested in career advancement. Among the hundreds of statements detailed in Court documents is a manager telling one employee, “Men are here to make a career and women aren’t. Retail is for housewives who just need to earn extra money.” Another male manager declared, “Women should be home, barefoot and pregnant” – and NOT as a bad joke.

Pay Disparities. The women at Wal-Mart earned less than men, even after accounting for seniority, turnover and performance. In fact, the women had higher performance ratings and more years of employment on average, yet made 5% to 15% less: an average of $5,000 per year less than comparable men.

Promotion Problems. Women received fewer promotional opportunities for in-store management positions, and had to wait longer for the promotions they did receive.

Hiding Discrimination. Despite Wal-Mart's policy prohibiting employees from discussing pay, women discovered they were regularly paid less than male counterparts. A female assistant manager discovered that a less-experienced male assistant manager earned $10,000/year more than she did when someone gave her his misplaced W2. One woman realized that she earned less because “many male associates [at her store] brag[ged] about their pay.”

Retaliation for Complaints. Although Wal-Mart’s “Open Door” policy supposedly allowed employees to air complaints, in reality it “was a façade and resulted only in retaliation,” according to one employee. Another reported that a Wal-Mart Home Office representative told female employees who made complaints of sex and race discrimination, “I can fire you, without taking any steps, for using the [O]pen [D]oor [policy].”

Wal-Mart has long been fueling a race to the bottom through its low standards of wages, benefits and working conditions. The company has been found guilty of numerous wage and hour and overtime violations, unfair labor practices, and absenteeism policies that punish workers for using their paid sick days. This lawsuit could put the brakes on; sending the message to all employers that illegal wage discrimination won’t be tolerated, even if you are the nation’s largest employer.

Evidence strongly suggests that sex discrimination is rampant at Wal-Mart. It can be stopped by a class action resolution to address the company-wide problem. This case will educate the public about employer responsibilities and employee rights in the workplace. All companies, including Wal-Mart, must be fair to all employees – men and women alike.

Linda Meric is the Executive Director of 9to5, National Association of Working Women, a national membership-based organization of low-income women working to improve policies on issues that directly affect them.

Mary Henderson of Canon City, Colorado is a former Wal-Mart assistant manager who is fighting for a better tomorrow for her daughters and 12 granddaughters.

Two Million Americans Are Waiting ...

The news of the day centers on whether Congress will extend unemployment insurance benefits to the millions of American workers who are out of a job -- or if it will only do so if in a compromise agreement to pass tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.

Basically today's reports from Capitol Hill tell us that unemployed workers are being held hostage. Meanwhile, there are children to care for, mortgages and rent to be paiid, a holiday season upon us. Congress might be reminded of what it should do by this op-ed from 9to5 National Director Linda Meric. It must think like struggling families -- and extend unemployment benefits to jobless workers NOW!

Here is a link to the version of Meric's op-ed that appeared, appropriately, in the Baltimore AFRO, just 30 or so miles from the nation's Capitol.

http://www.afro.com/sections/opinion/story.htm?storyid=3338

Lame Duck Congress: Help American Families Today, Don’t Let Unemployment Benefits Expire

by Linda A. Meric

There was good news for our flailing economy from the Bureau of Labor Statistics this month. More than 150,000 jobs were added in the United States in October and private sector payrolls grew by 159,000.

But there was some news that didn’t change: unemployment held steady at 9.6 percent. Almost 15 million Americans are out of work and more than 41 percent of them have been unemployed for six months or more. So, adding 150,000 jobs, while a good sign, is still just a drop in the economic bucket.

With job growth still sluggish, and with so many people out of work, it’s critical that unemployment benefits not be allowed to expire. President Obama has even expressed his support for this important step, saying “I think it makes sense for us to extend unemployment insurance because there are still a lot of folks out there hurting.”

But the President obviously can’t do it alone. This is a job for the lame duck Congress, returning to the hill this week – and partisan politics should not get in the way.

Emergency unemployment benefits are set to expire at the end of this month. If no extension is approved, two million American workers will lose their unemployment benefits – and more importantly lose their lifeline to economic security for themselves and their families – just in time for the holidays.

“The current expiration date will cause a cascade of unemployed workers to fall off the unemployment rolls, prematurely cutting benefits for some and making any form of an extension completely unavailable for others,” according to the National Employment Law Project (NELP). Plus, as the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities noted, there are still far more unemployed workers than there are job openings.

This is worth noting, too: An extension of benefits does not mean that workers who have completely exhausted their benefits will get even one penny more. It only means that those who are currently receiving UI benefits will not get cut off mid stream.

It means that working women – who face staggering unemployment at the same time that women are now the primary or co-breadwinner in more than 2/3 of American families – will be able to provide for their families; to make ends meet. Really, every dollar provided in UI benefits for struggling families pumps two dollars back into our economy because they have so many needs. These aren’t dollars that get stored up somewhere for savings. These are dollars that are needed and spent right now; for food, for clothing, for rent, for utilities – to keep the lights on and the furnace going.

The lame duck Congress can’t leave American families out in the cold this holiday season.

It doesn’t have much time. It must extend emergency unemployment insurance benefits and do so quickly.

America’s families are waiting.

Meric is Executive Director of 9to5, National Association of Working Women

Congress Must Pass PFA & Other Critical Legislation

With the House and Senate expected to reconvene on November 15th, this will be the last opportunity for the 111^thCongress to pass legislation deemed imperative by the coalition of more than 200 national civil and human rights organizations.

Passage of the Paycheck Fairness Act and the DREAM Act, a repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” an extension of unemployment insurance, and the confirmation of President Obama’s judicial nominees have been identified as top priorities for the final months of 2010. Also, critically important is a Senate vote on the ratification of the Convention to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).

Here's what Wade Henderson, President & CEO of The Leadership Conference, has to say about these final months and lame duck priorities: “Now that the midterm elections are over, Americans expect Congress to work together on the important needs of our country..Each of these priorities will make our nation stronger and more just, and they deserve to be high on the list of ‘must-do’ legislation before the current Congress adjourns.”

As a member of the LCCR coalition of 200 organizations, 9to5 agrees with these priorities:

• Passage of the Paycheck Fairness Act would deter pay discrimination by strengthening penalties for equal pay violations. “This Congress showed some remarkable backbone for women’s equality when it passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act,” said Nancy Zirkin, executive vice president of The Leadership Conference. “Passing this legislation would reinforce this Congress’ commitment to narrowing the pay gap to help support family incomes and strengthen our economy.”
• An extension of unemployment insurance, which is set expire at the end of this month, would provide a lifeline for millions of workers in the stalled economy. “Congress has never cut off unemployment benefits when the jobless rate was this high. Extending them will help the economy recover while providing badly needed assistance to workers unable to find jobs,” Henderson said.
• Passage of the DREAM Act, which Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid pledged to bring up for a vote during the lame duck session, would allow immigrant youths the opportunity to serve in our military, attend college, and earn citizenship. “The DREAM Act will help ensure that children who have worked hard, graduated from high school, and obeyed the law have the opportunity to be productive workers in the American economy,” Zirkin said.
• The repeal of “Don’t ask, Don’t Tell,” which has been under consideration for several months, would strengthen our military and advance LGBT equality. “Our service members should not have to live in fear of dismissal simply for being gay or lesbian. In the face of two wars and dwindling recruitment, our military needs our best and brightest citizens to serve regardless of their race, gender, religion, or sexual orientation,” Henderson said.
• The confirmation of pending judicial nominees who have faced a level of obstructionism that is unprecedented in American history. “People all over America are being denied justice because our overworked courts have more than 100 empty benches without judges to hear cases,” Zirkin said. “The Senate must put aside petty partisanship, eliminate obstructionist tactics, and commit to taking yes-or-no confirmation votes on the pending judicial nominees before adjourning.”
• Ratification of CEDAW, a landmark international agreement that affirms principles of fundamental human rights and equality for women around the world. The Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Human Rights and the Law has scheduled a hearing on the CEDAW treaty on November 18. “Ratifying the CEDAW treaty would continue America’s proud bipartisan tradition of promoting and protecting human rights,” said June Zeitlin, CEDAW Project director.

Write or call your members of Congress and ensure they know that these priorities are YOUR priorities.