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Economic Equity News: April 6, 2016

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Economic equity news is a weekly round-up of articles by Donna Seymour of AAUW-NYS that features our core values of poverty solutions, opportunity and access, workplace fairness, healthy lives, equal pay and representation at all tables. Sign up for our mailing list to receive this directly to your inbox.

By at least one measure, inequality among working men has grown for decades. But, in 2015, it accelerated: The wage gap among men saw its largest single-year increase on record. Top earners — men who made more than 95 percent of their peers — saw wages last year rise by 9.9 percent, according to an analysis of federal data. Men in the middle — with earnings higher than half their peers — saw a much-smaller 2.6 percent increase.

On the heels of California’s announcement, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and the state legislature reached their own historic agreement this week to raise the state’s minimum wage to $15. Although Governor Cuomo’s strong statewide $15 wage proposal was weakened by the Republican-controlled state senate, it still sets all regions on a path to a $15 minimum wage: New York City goes to $15 by December 2018, the suburbs go to $15 by December 2021, and upstate New York goes to $12.50 by December 2020, and then will increase to $15 over a period to be determined by the state budget director.

To close gaps like these, pay equity advocates have, rightly, pushed for a higher minimum wage, paid leave, better child care, stronger unions, negotiation training for women, and legislation like the Paycheck Fairness Act. But these solutions, still struggling to gain traction, don’t get at the root of the pay gap: We’re biased. That’s just how our brains are wired. And right now, the default is wired to favor men.

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — New York’s Assembly has given final legislative approval to New York’s budget for the fiscal year that began Monday, voting for the last four bills in the packageFriday evening. Speaker Carl Heastie says provisions that will gradually raise the state minimum wage to $15 an hour, establish 12 weeks of paid family leave for New York workers and cut income tax rates for middle-class filers helped make it the best budget he’s seen in 16 years in the Legislature.

Women are still outnumbered by men in the most prestigious positions. That’s why AAUW is proud to help draw Women’s History Month to a close with a special event — ringing the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange. AAUW CEO Linda Hallman and Board Chair Patricia Fae Ho rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday. This historic moment came on the same day that AAUW released its Barriers and Bias report on women in leadership at the Newseum. Fun fact: the first woman member of the American Stock Exchange was (of course!) an AAUW member!

Donna Seymour, who hails from the (far upstate) North Country of NYS, has spent 40 plus years advocating for children, women and family issues, equity, sustainability, and social justice issues. Currently serving as the Public Policy VP for AAUW-NYS (the American Association University Women), she is also a member the League of Women Voters, the Equal Pay Coalition, PTA, NOW, and Planned Parenthood, just to name a few.