BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SENATE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
Senator Ricardo Lara, Chair
2015 - 2016 Regular Session
SB 358 (Jackson) - Conditions of employment: gender wage
differential.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
| |
| |
| |
-----------------------------------------------------------------
|--------------------------------+--------------------------------|
| | |
|Version: May 12, 2015 |Policy Vote: L. & I.R. 4 - 0, |
| | JUD. 5 - 1 |
| | |
|--------------------------------+--------------------------------|
| | |
|Urgency: No |Mandate: Yes |
| | |
|--------------------------------+--------------------------------|
| | |
|Hearing Date: May 18, 2015 |Consultant: Robert Ingenito |
| | |
-----------------------------------------------------------------
This bill does not meet the criteria for referral to the
Suspense File.
Bill
Summary: SB 358 would, among other things, revise the
California Equal Pay Act such that when a pay differential
exists between two people of the opposite sex, the employer must
demonstrate one of a series of specified factors as
justification for the differential.
Fiscal
Impact: The Department of Industrial Relations (DIR) indicates
that it would incur costs of $127,000 in 2015-16 and $120,000
ongoing (special funds) to implement the provisions of the bill.
SB 358 (Jackson) Page 1 of
?
Background: The California Equal Pay Act was first established in 1949 and
requires that men and women in the same workplace be given equal
pay for equal work. Nevertheless, studies show that women are
still paid less than their male counterparts, resulting in what
is referred to as the "gender wage gap."
Each year, the United States Census Bureau and the United States
Bureau of Labor Statistics provide an estimate of the wage gap
using annual earnings based on survey data. Although the gender
wage gap has narrowed in recent decades, female workers
nationwide earned 78 percent of what male workers were paid as
of 2013, implying a wage gap of 22 cents. In 2014, the gap
narrowed further but was still 16 cents.
Recent federal legislation has been attempted to eliminate the
national gender wage gap. The Fair Pay Act (H.R. 438/S. 168,
113th Congress) would have expanded the scope of the EPA to
include racial and ethnic minority protection and narrowed the
"factors other than sex" upon which an employer could rely to
justify a wage differential. Those bills would also have
substituted "equivalent jobs" for an "equal" work standard.
Equivalent jobs are those whose composite of skill, effort,
responsibility, and working conditions are equivalent in value
(or worth to the employer), even if the jobs are dissimilar.
Those prior federal efforts failed to move out of their
respective houses. The Fair Pay Act has been reintroduced this
year as H.R. 1787 (Norton, 114th Congress) and is in its first
committee.
Proposed Law:
This bill would do all of the following:
Prohibit an employer from paying any of its employees at
wage rates less than the rates paid to employees of the
opposite sex for substantially similar work, when viewed as
a composite of skill, effort, and responsibility, and
performed under similar working conditions, except where
the employer demonstrates:
SB 358 (Jackson) Page 2 of
?
o The pay differential is based upon one or more
of the following factors: (1) a seniority system; (2)
a merit system; (3) a system that measures earnings by
quantity or quality of production; or (4) a bona fide
factor that is not based on or derived from a
sex-based differential in compensation and is
consistent with a business necessity, as defined, such
as a difference in education, training, or experience
that is job related with respect to the position in
question.
o Each factor relied upon is applied reasonably.
o The one or more factors relied upon account
for the entire pay differential.
This bill would modify the Equal Protection Act terms by
replacing the term "equal work" with "substantially similar
work."
This bill would extend the employer's record retention
requirement from two to three years.
This bill would prohibit an employer from discharging, or in any
manner discriminating or retaliating against, any employee by
reason of any action taken by the employee to invoke or assist
in any manner the enforcement of the Equal Pay Act.
This bill would make it unlawful for an employer to prohibit an
employee from disclosing the employee's own wages, discussing
the wages of others, inquiring about another employee's wages,
or aiding or encouraging any other employee to exercise her or
her related rights.
SB 358 (Jackson) Page 3 of
?
This bill would extend the existing enforcement mechanisms, as
specified, for wage discrimination under the Act to claims for
retaliation, and would provide a one-year statute of limitations
for retaliation claims.
This bill would authorize any employee who has been discharged,
discriminated or retaliated against, in the terms and conditions
of his or her employment because the employee engaged in any
conduct delineated in the Act to recover in a civil action
reinstatement and reimbursement for lost wages and work
benefits, caused by the acts of the employer, including interest
thereon, as well as appropriate equitable relief.
This bill would require a civil action to recover wages for
retaliation to be commenced no later than one-year after the
cause of action occurs.
Related
Legislation: AB 1354 (Dodd, 2015) would enact the Equal Pay for
Equal Work Act of 2015 and require an employer with 100 or more
employees, prior to becoming a contractor or subcontractor with
the state, to submit an income equality program to the
Department of Fair Employment and Housing for approval and
certification and require the income equality program to include
the collection of summary data on the compensation paid to
employees, including data sorted by gender and race, and
policies designed to ensure income equality and prevent unlawful
discrimination. AB 1354 is currently in the Assembly
Appropriations Committee.
Staff
Comments: Any local government costs resulting from the mandate
in this measure are not state-reimbursable because the mandate
only involves the definition of a crime or the penalty for
conviction of a crime.
-- END --
SB 358 (Jackson) Page 4 of
?