Today Senators Hillary Clinton (D-NY) and Tom Harkin (D-IA) announced the findings of a new Government Accountability Office (GAO) study, using the report to knock the Executive Branch for its alleged failure to crack down on pay inequity. This report recommends:

that the EEOC and OFCCP monitor performance of enforcement efforts more closely and that the OFCCP implement a more rigorous data system to carry out its duties.

Clinton then tried to use this report to justify the Ledbetter bill :

We must hold the Bush Administration accountable for enforcing equal pay requirements already on the books and we must finally end the pay inequity that is short-changing women and families by enacting the Fair Pay Act and the Paycheck Fairness Act,

How would passing a bill that removes the statute of limitations on discrimination claims make the Administration, any Administration for that matter,  more accountable for enforcing current law? This bill will only prevent the timely remedy of actual instances of unlawful discrimination by eliminating the filing periods needed to address real claims. 

Politico’s The Crypt blog has the scheduling e-mail from the Senate Democratic caucus outlining leadership’s plans for the remaining two-and-a-half weeks of the 110th Congress.  The House target date for adjournment is September 26, but the Senate has its doubts, reasonably so. 

Presidential and Congressional politics will drive the debate as it does every four years about this time, no mater who’s in control. Politico highlights the “Equal pay legislation” reference to conclude Senator Reid will bring back the Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, i.e., the bill to eliminate all statutes of limitations on filing employment discrimination suits. Seems a logical conclusion, especially giving Ledbetter’s prominent speaking role at the Democratic convention.

Here are several documents explaining why the Ledbetter pay legislation mostly benefits trial lawyers while actually discourages the prompt addressing of workplace discrimination.

• Business Industry Letter to the Senate on Ledbetter, April 22, 2008
• Statement of Administration Policy on H.R. 2831, Ledbetter Fair Pay Act

Among the other issues the Senate Dems anticipate addressing… (continue reading…)

More updates on yesterday’s 26-17 vote by the House Education and Labor Committee to report out H.R. 1338, the Fair Pay Act, which seeks to mandate equal pay based on gender. If employers fail to meet the law’s standards, lawyers are standing by to sue, encouraged by the bill’s lifting of all caps on damages. Expect the bill on the House floor toward the middle of next week.

News release from Chairman George Miller (D-CA), “House Labor Committee Passes Bill to Help Close Gender Wage Gap“: “This is a historic day in the fight for equal rights for women. If we are serious about closing the gender pay gap, we must get serious about punishing those who would otherwise scoff at the weak sanctions under current law,” said Rep. George Miller (D-CA), chairman of the committee. “Any wage gap based on gender is unacceptable, especially during these tough economic times. By allowing wage discrimination to continue, we hold down women and their families while harming the American economy as a whole.”

News release from Rep. Buck McKeon (R-CA), Ranking Member, “Democrats Favor Trial Lawyers Over Working Families“: “This bill isn’t about paycheck fairness.  It’s already against federal law to discriminate, in pay or other employment practices, on the basis of sex.  And rightfully so,” said Rep. Howard P. “Buck” McKeon (R-CA), the senior Republican on the committee.  “This bill is about making it easier for trial lawyers to cash in under the Equal Pay Act, and making it more difficult for employers to make legitimate employment decisions based on factors other than sex.”

Update from the Washington Labor & Employment Wire from Akin Gump, “Paycheck Fairness Act (H.R. 1338) Passes Out of House Committee.

News release from the ACLU, “ACLU Supports the Paycheck Fairness Act“: “There should be no doubt that improvements to the Equal Pay Act are necessary,” said ACLU Washington Legislative Office Director Caroline Fredrickson. “More than four decades after the enactment of the Equal Pay Act, women still make only 77 cents for every dollar made by their male counterparts, a wage disparity that cannot be explained by differences in qualifications, education, skills, training, responsibility or life choices. Rather, in many cases, the pay disparity has resulted from unlawful sex discrimination.”

Good thing for the ACLU that inflammatory falsehoods are constitutionally protected. All of the above assertions are demonstrably incorrect. We point you to the diligently documented testimony of the Hudson Institute’s Diana Furchtgott-Roth, an economist, as well as to her op-ed from the New York Sun, “Who’s the Better Feminist?”

Finally, from Secretary of Labor Chao’s letter to the committee: “H.R. 1338 would unjustifiably amend the Equal Pay Act (EPA) to allow for, among other things, unlimited compensatory and punitive damages, even when a disparity in pay was unintentional. It would also require the Department to replace its successful approach to detecting pay discrimination with a failed methodology that was abandoned because it had a 93 percent false positive rate. For these reasons and those outlined blow, if H.R 1338 were presented to the President, I would recommend that he veto the bill.”