The 2022 Equal Pay Day in the United States is Tuesday, March 15.
According to the National Committee on Pay Equity, or NCPE, “This date symbolizes how far into the year women must work to earn what men earned in the previous year.”
The NCPE reported that it began “Equal Pay Day” in 1996 as a public awareness event to illustrate the gap between men's and women's wages.
The observance originally was called “National Pay Inequity Awareness Day” and changed to Equal Pay Day in 1998.
“Since Census statistics showing the latest wage figures will not be available until late August or September, NCPE leadership decided years ago to select a Tuesday in April as Equal Pay Day. (Tuesday was selected to represent how far into the next work week women must work to earn what men earned the previous week.) The date also is selected to avoid religious holidays and other significant events,” the NCPE reported.
“Because women earn less, on average, than men, they must work longer for the same amount of pay. The wage gap is even greater for most women of color,” NCPE said.
Equal Pay Day doesn’t fall on the same date everywhere.
For example, in Germany this year, it was marked on March 7, while it will take place on March 24 in the Netherlands and on March 25 in France.
The European Commission reported that women in the European Union are hourly paid 14.1% less than men on average, which equals almost two months of salary.
The European Commission marks Nov. 10 “as a symbolic day to raise awareness that female workers in Europe still earn on average less than their male colleagues.”
March 15 is ‘Equal Pay Day’
- LAKE COUNTY NEWS REPORTS
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