Laws are on the books in Illinois designed to help close the damaging gender wage gap, but many women are unaware of them.
To change that, a $350,000 grant has been awarded to the Illinois Department of Labor to partner with Chicago-based advocacy group Women Employed to raise awareness about pay equity, pay transparency standards and requirements under the Illinois Pay Act.
A particular focus of the grant is low-wage working women of color, said U.S. Rep. Robin Kelly, a Democrat from Matteson, in announcing the grant funding last week.
Among Black working women in Illinois, the wage gap is $26,054, compared to white non-Hispanic men, according to the National Partnership for Women & Families, that found Black women only earn 61 cents for every dollar earned by white non-Hispanic men. The gap among Latina women is even worse at $34,656, the partnership reports, at 48 cents to the dollar. Among white non-Hispanic women, the partnership said the gap is $15,810, or 76 cents to the dollar.
“Women often get taken advantage of because they don’t realize what the pay ranges are or the appropriate standards of compensation, and low-wage women of color are most at risk for wage exploitation,” said Kelly. “Knowledge is power. This will give women the knowledge and power to demand their rightful wages.”
The funds will be used to educate women about Illinois’ No Salary History law, which prohibits employers in Illinois as well as temp agencies and headhunters from asking job candidates about their current or prior salaries, wages, benefits and other compensation.
The law was designed to help prevent pay discrimination in Illinois by ensuring new hires are paid based on the responsibilities of the job and the experience they bring to the table, not what they have earned in the past, according to Women Employed.
“If you’re asked what you made previously, that’s going to continue to perpetuate this gap because then (employers) are going to go off of the number that you are giving them,” said Yolanda Carrillo, chief legal counsel with the Illinois Department of Labor. “So, if you’re already being underpaid, that’s going to continue to further that gap.”
The grant funds also will be used to educate women on requirements companies will face in 2024 to certify with the Illinois Department of Labor that they are in compliance with the Equal Pay Act.
“They will have to confirm that the business doesn’t restrict certain genders to specific roles, that they make employment decisions without regard to sex … explain how the business reviews wages and benefits,” said Sharmili Majmudar, executive vice president of Policy and Organizational Impact at Women Employed. “Businesses need to be able to talk about how they ensure that there aren’t pay disparities, what is their system for determining employee compensation.”
The certification requirements apply to employers with more than 100 employees. Data will have to be provided by gender and race, said Carrillo.
“We have in Illinois made some legislative strides particularly on pay equity and transparency,” said Majmudar. “The purpose of this grant to really make sure that all women workers across the state are aware of the pay equity protections that exist for them particularly women in low-wage roles.
“We want to, through this grant, really strengthen the state’s capacity to enforce these laws and other employment protections particular for that group of women. The goal is to make sure that the intention of legislative action is truly realized.”
The grant is part of a total of $2 million in funding made available across the country for organizations to develop partnerships with community-based organizations and other nonprofits to conduct outreach to low-income and marginalized women workers to help them understand and exercise their rights and benefits in the workplace, according to Kelly’s office.
Outreach in Illinois will be done in phases, said Carrillo. Informational materials will be developed and disseminated through texts, traditional and social media, she said. Plans also include more in-depth, in-person education and training with women organizations.
“We will be utilizing the train the trainer model,” said Carrillo.
The funding will be used to target women in and out of the workforce. It comes at a critical time given the given the disproportionate negative economic impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on working women, particularly low-wage women workers. The pay discrimination has immediate and long-term repercussions, said Majmudar.
“Women make up a significant amount of lower paid positions, she said. “If you are in a low-paying job, you are already living paycheck to paycheck. If you are losing out on hundreds of dollars a month because of a wage gap, it’s very hard to not only make ends meet, but to start building savings to have safety net in case you have financial emergency. It makes life for women in these roles so much more precarious.”
Majmudar said when women are not paid equally, it affects ability to pay for education or to buy a car or a house.
“On a more long-term basis, we have serious issues with women over 65 being much more likely than men to live at or below the poverty line,” she said.
That’s because they have less savings, less pension and Social Security income because of the wage gap, she said.
Majmudar said women should do some research before taking a job, talking to colleagues about salary and wages.
Women Employed recommends consulting websites such as pay scale, Glassdoor or Salary.com to help determine the market pay range for jobs in a field and by location. Many professional organizations also publish salary guides that can help determine salary levels for an industry, the advocacy group notes.
Women Employed has developed a No Salary History and Pay Equity Toolkit. It’s accessible at womenemployed.org/ under the resources tab.
For more information on the Equal Pay Act and the salary history ban, go to www2.illinois.gov/idol/ and click FAQs under the About tab.
Francine Knowles is a freelance columnist for the Daily Southtown.
