HomeLearning CenterEqual Pay Day May Be The Saddest Day Of The Year

Equal Pay Day May Be The Saddest Day Of The Year

Originally published by Roberta Matuson for Forbes

It’s official.

If you’re a woman, today is your last day of work.

Take the rest of the year off unless you like working for free.

This year, March 12th is Equal Pay Day.

Equal Pay Day is not a time for celebration. There will be no cake or Facebook reminders. Nor will anyone receive flowers.

This date symbolizes how far into the year women must work to earn what men earned in the previous year.

It’s 2024, and despite attempts to narrow the gap, women still earn 16% less than men on average.

Women earn just 84 cents for every dollar a man makes.

A 20-year-old woman just starting full-time, year-round work stands to lose $407,760 over a 40-year career compared to her male counterpart.

Now is not the time for pity.

What we need is a resolve to fix what we all know is broken.

Here’s how to change this situation.

1. Get mad enough to do something about pay inequity

Nothing is going to change until enough people get fed up and start to advocate for themselves and their fellow female employees.

2. Speak up

You don’t need to be a woman or be underrepresented to speak up. Say something if you see or hear something around pay that doesn’t sound right.

3. Don’t blame women for the current state of affairs

Refrain from saying things like, “It’s not our fault men are better negotiators than women.” When you do this, you make this a woman’s issue. There aren’t that many women in positions of power, which means they have very limited ability to push this change forward.

4. Advocate for a pay audit

This is where your company looks at the entire compensation structure and how much each employee is paid in relation to team members in comparable jobs. Share best practices on how forward-thinking companies like SalesforceCRM +0.2% are working toward pay equity in their organizations.

My hope is that one day, this horrible holiday will go away.

Until then, I will keep speaking up for the millions of women who are too busy working second jobs to speak up for themselves.

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