By Lindsay Street, Statehouse correspondent | No one opposing the Pay Equity Act really wants to talk about it. After all, who wants to be on the record for opposing a bill that would require employers to pay the same wage to all employees who work the same job and hours — regardless of their gender or race?
“You’re instantly going to be labeled a sexist jerk,” said D.C.-based Independent Women’s Forum President Carrie Lukas. The conservative think tank focused on women’s policy issues opposes state pay equity laws. “It’s tremendously dangerous (to oppose equity laws), and you get a lot of very vicious criticism when you question anything with women in the workplace.”
State and national studies have reported wide wage gaps for women, minorities, those with disabilities and the LGBTQ community when compared with white, straight men.
Advocates for the recently-introduced S.C. pay equity legislation found in H. 3615 and S. 372 appear to agree with Lukas on the political implications of opposing the bills.
“That’s a really unwise position to take, given that women are an economic force in our state as employees and consumers and most people are overwhelmingly in favor of equity and opportunity and realize this is an important strategy,” said Ann Warner, CEO of South Carolina-based and progressive Women’s Rights and Empowerment Network.
The House and Senate versions of the Pay Equity Act seek to mandate that all full-time employees, regardless of gender, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, race or religion, must be paid the same for the same work. Failure to do so could result in employee litigation against the employer.
“It’s an incredibly strong and robust piece of legislation that would both help to correct for some of the current disparities and prevent future wage discrimination,” Warner said.
The bills were introduced two weeks ago, and have been assigned to the Senate Labor, Commerce and Industry Committee and the House Judiciary Committee. Neither bill has been assigned a subcommittee yet.
Bipartisan support growing
Advocates for pay equity say the biggest threat to the bills in the House and Senate are a quiet death with the proposals being snuffed out in a subcommittee before ever having a chance to make it back to the floor. A version of the proposal has been floating in the House for several years, according to lead sponsor Rep. Wendy Brawley, D-Richland.
Lexington Republican Sen. Katrina Shealy introduced the Senate’s version of the bill. She is supporting it because the proposal includes other protected classes such as national origin, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity and more.
Shealy said pay equity is a policy few are talking about this session, despite the fact that the proposal could have a big impact on the state — if only it gets through committee and back to the floor. She said the House’s version has the best chance, where that body has 23 women lawmakers — one fifth of the chamber — to help push the bill to a vote.
Statehouse Report reached out to 10 male lawmakers for this story — eight Republicans and two Democrats. Few had anything to say. Most said they had not read the bill yet. Both versions have bipartisan support, and the House version has at least two Republican men co-sponsors: Reps. Gary Clary of Pickens and William Cogswell of Charleston. Neither responded to requests for comment.
Senate LCI Chairman Thomas Alexander, R-Oconee, said he has been focused on workforce development and has not looked at the legislation in detail. He said he will read the bill once a subcommittee sends it to full committee. House Judiciary Chairman Peter McCoy, R-Charleston, did not respond to requests for comment.
‘Irrational disparities’
When advocates talk about pay equity, they cite the existing wage gap experienced by women, minorities and people with disabilities. These are the pennies-on-the-dollar statistics that are compared with white males.
The Darla Moore School of Business released a report in 2017 that said women in South Carolina earn 73 cents for every dollar that men earn, and that black women earn 53 cents for every dollar that white men earn. WREN did not have statistics for the LGBTQ community or for those with disabilities. Some national statistics peg the gap at about 14 percent for those with disabilities. A Prudential survey showed that while homosexual men earned somewhat more than heterosexual women, most in the LGBTQ community received far less in salary when compared with heterosexual men.
“The wage gap has been wide for decades,” Warner said. “It started to close when the federal Equal Pay Act was introduced in the 1960s but that has really stagnated in the last couple of decades … There is a need for more intervention at the public policy level to help correct these irrational disparities that come up.”
Warner said that most employers are not seeking to actively discriminate against employees and that many times, they are basing salary off of an applicant’s previous salary history — which can count against women and minorities as the cycle of being paid less is perpetuated. The Pay Equity Act would remove that question from applications.
Opponents say the statistics are misleading.
Lukas said if pay studies control for the number of hours worked, about one-third of the women’s wage gap goes away. But she agreed a gap exists, just not that it’s the government’s role to fix it.
“There are instances of abuse but I think some of the desires to try to control or make sure there is a fair process can end up inadvertently hurting those that are trying to help.”
She said a woman with less experience may not be hired due to an employer deciding to hire a man with more experience since they would receive the same compensation. She also said a “heightened sense” of litigation in the state could scare off economic development.
Warner disagreed, saying the Pay Equity Act could actually spur economic development in the state due to sending a strong signal of valuing work from all people, and helping with some labor shortages in the state by inspiring loyalty.
- In 2018, Massachusetts enacted a pay equity law. Read more about it here.
Work ahead
Republican Sen. Sandy Senn of Charleston is the only female lawmaker on the Senate LCI Committee. She said she hasn’t dived into the legislation but she felt it had “a whole heck of a lot of merit.”
“It will be hard pressed for our male colleagues to say ‘no’ to that but I’ve seen stranger things,” Senn said. “It could not come out of the desk drawer.”
In the House, Brawley is working to gain more support.
“We will do everything we can,” Brawley said. “It’s hard for me to understand how anyone can be opposed to paying people fairly for the work they’re doing.”
Warner said a vocal constituency will be needed for this bill.
“We have to keep the pressure up with our legislators and our business community to say this is good business … This is going to help our economy grow,” she said.
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