The state’s Fair Pay Act closes a loophole employers have used to justify unequal pay.
Women Empowered / Via women-empowered.com
California adopted the toughest equal pay legislation in the country this week, altering key language to improve enforcement and increasing protections for workers from retaliation.
The California Fair Pay Act, signed by Democratic Governor Jerry Brown Tuesday, will hold employers to a higher, more rigorous standard than they face in other states when it comes to paying men and women equally for equal labor.
Here's what it means for women working in California — and the companies employing them.
Under the new law, women and men who do "substantially similar" work must now receive equal pay. Previously, employers focused on the the term "equal work" in regulations to excuse gendered discrepancies in pay, law-makers say. If employees had different titles or worked in different offices, for example, lawyers used those details to claim the work was not identical.
According to state Sen. Hannah-Beth Jackson (D-Santa Barbara), who wrote the newly-signed act, courts have too often interpreted fair pay laws to mean workers must hold exactly the same job to receive equal pay. Now, employers will shoulder a heavier burden of proof to demonstrate any existing pay gap is tied to skill or seniority, rather than gender.
This means a woman cleaning hotel rooms now has a stronger case that she should be paid as much as a man cleaning the hotel's lobby, Jackson offered. A grocery clerk at one location may now more effectively claim she should be paid as much as the male clerk at a comparable store owned by the same company.
Here's What California's New Equal Pay Law Means http://ift.tt/1Omhlga
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