Senate blocks wage-gap bill

Measure election-year ploy by Democrats, GOP asserts

WASHINGTON - Senate Republicans on Wednesday blocked legislation meant to close the pay gap between men and women, framing an election-year fight between the parties over whose policies are friendlier to women.

The bill was seen as an attempt by Democrats to press their electoral advantage among women in the coming midterm elections, but they fell short of the 60 votes they needed to prevent a filibuster and advance the legislation.

Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., voted for the bill, while Sen.John Boozman, R-Ark., voted against it.

“For reasons known only to them, Senate Republicans don’t seem to be interested in closing wage gaps for working women,” Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, said in a floor speech.

Republican lawmakers have said that given existing anti-discrimination laws, the legislation is redundant and a transparent attempt by Democrats to distract from President Barack Obama’s health-care law.

Democrats have proposed bills to narrow the pay gap in the past; they pushed the same legislation the last two election years, 2012 and 2010, only to see Senate Republicans scuttle the measures.

In 2009, Congress approved the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which allowed women to take legal action well after pay discrepancy has occurred.

Wednesday’s measure, known as the Paycheck Fairness Act, would have expanded on that law by banning workplace retaliation for those who discuss their pay. It also would require employers to explain why workers in similar jobs earn more than others and would allow workers to seek punitive damages, in addition to back pay, in legal battles.

Obama signed executive measures Tuesday that imposed similar requirements on government contractors.

“Republicans in Congress continue to oppose serious efforts to create jobs, grow the economy, and level the playing field for working families,” Obama said in a written statement after the Wednesday vote. “That’s wrong, and it’s harmful for our national efforts to rebuild an economy that gives every American who works hard a fair shot to get ahead.”

Republican leaders assailed Democrats’ attempt to paint them as unsympathetic to women in the workforce.The Senate Republican Conference on Wednesday called the pay equity legislation “the latest ploy in the Democrats’ election-year playbook.”

GOP lawmakers said the measure could hinder employers from granting raises, or permitting flexible hours in exchange for lower pay, for fear of costly lawsuits.

Sen. Mitch McConnell, the minority leader who is fighting for re-election against a female candidate in Kentucky, said in a floor speech Wednesday that women had lost ground on Obama’s watch, with declining wages and growing numbers in poverty.

“In other words,” he said, “when it comes to American women overall, what we’ve seen over the past 5½ years is less income and more poverty. That’s the story Senate Democrats don’t want to talk about.

“At a time when the Obama economy is already hurting women so much, this legislation would double down on job loss - all while lining the pockets of trial lawyers,” McConnell said. “In other words, it’s just another Democrat idea that threatens to hurt the very people it claims to help.”

Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., the longest-serving woman in Congress, said Wednesday that it “brings tears to my eyes” to hear the stories of women being paid less than men for equal work. Studies show women earn 77cents, on average, for every $1 paid to men, though research also suggests that only a portion of that discrepancy is because of discrimination.

The bill by Mikulski is aimed at tightening the 1963 law that made it illegal to pay women less than men for comparable jobs because of their sex.

“When I hear all these phony reasons, some are mean and some are meaningless, I do get emotional,” she said of arguments against the legislation. “I get angry. I get outraged. I get volcanic.”

Mikulski was the latest Democrat to play off former CIA Director Michael Hayden’s recent comment that Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., was motivated by “emotional feeling” when she sought an investigation of the spy agency’s harsh treatment of terrorism suspects.

The pay-equity bill is part of a broader Democratic strategy to appeal to low- and middle-income voters with pocketbook legislation like an increase in the federal minimum wage and an extension of long-term unemployment benefits. Neither of those measures is expected to pass in a divided House.

Women consistently vote more often for Democrats than men do. They tilted Democratic in every election since 1976 but two: 2002 and 2010. In those two elections women divided about evenly, even as Republicans picked up congressional seats.

The vote to proceed on the pay-equity bill was 53-44, six votes short of a filibuster-proof majority after accounting for a “no” vote by Reid, a procedural move allowing him to put the bill on the floor again.

Democrats may return to the issue in the months ahead.

Many Republicans waged a protest vote over party leaders’ refusal to allow amendments to the bill, and Sen. Angus King of Maine, the independent who votes with Democrats, joined the GOP filibuster.

King said later that the bill ignored the real reasons for the pay gap between the sexes, such as companies that make it hard for women with children to continue working.

Data show that men tend to out earn women at every level of education and in comparable jobs.

Yet women generally work shorter hours and are likelier to take lower-paying jobs. Sixty-two percent of the 3.3 million workers earning at or below the minimum wage last year were women, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Information for this article was contributed by David S. Joachim of The New York Times; by Lisa Mascaro of the Tribune Washington Bureau; and by Alan Fram of The Associated Press.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 04/10/2014

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