Women's Wage

In the first unit of the course Policy, we studied our government, how it works, what each branch does, people who represent the branches, how bills are made, we talked about the presidential debate in depth about what's going on, who makes a good argument and who has valid points. We also read some chapters of the book "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien, it's about the Vietnam War and the book is written by a Vietnam Veteran so it's based on his experience and observations. With that we talked about war, world war 1 and world war 2, why it started, why we participated and how it affected U.S. We also went to a Vietnam National Museum where we saw exhibits of the war made from war veterans. It was really cool to engage in their work and see everything through their eyes. For our action, we wrote a letter about an issue that needs change. We wrote it specifically to someone who can change the outcome and hopefully with our letter they pursue that change. I chose the topic women's equal pay because it’s something I can relate to and that soon I will be looking for employee. I also chose to send my letter to President Obama because he has daughters and he can relate to this issue.

Men-And-Women-Double-Equal-Sign-Gender-Equlity. August 24, 2014. Photograph. Wikimedia Commons. Web. April 29, 2016. 

KIS
GCE Lab School
1535 N. Dayton St.
Chicago, IL. 60642

25 April 2016

President Obama
The White House.
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20500.

Dear President Obama,

Would you like to see a man get paid more money than your daughters? Do you think that’s fair? Well it’s the same thing now with women working as hard as men, but get paid less than men when they do the same job. Last year, “In 2015, female full-time workers made only 79 cents for every dollar earned by men, a gender wage gap of 21 percent.” I think that if anyone has the same amount of experience, does the job right and gets things done than that person should be paid same amount as anyone. It’s not fair that because of your gender or race you get put less than others especially with something that our whole government is based on which is money. Imagine a mother without a husband how will she provide for her children if she gets paid less than a man when she does the same thing as him.

Another big part are the job opportunities. Common jobs for men are software developers, project manager, construction and computer system administration. Common jobs for women are a registered nurse, elementary school teacher and human resources administrator. A study was done to show when women will get equal pay if nothing is done to improve this situation “slow pace as it has done for the past fifty years, it will take 44 years—or until 2059—for women to finally reach pay parity.”

On the other hand people could say “No one seems to think wage inequity is a problem where they work. Seven in 10 employees — that's men and women — in these countries believe that their current employers pay them equally.” In other countries there might be similar or equal pay, but not in the U.S. Women work hard in what they work for and they strive to stand out, to be recognized between all the men. Not paying equally can be the cause of women exposing themselves to gain money because they know that they won’t be as successful as men. I know that you are leaving the white house soon, but before you leave consider this and pass the bill. This bill will be beneficial to the women and for the country because with more equality there is more diversity.

Thank you for your time.
Sincerely,
KIS,
GCE Student

Resources:

• “Do Men Really Make More Money Than Women?” PayScale. Web. April 28, 2016.
• Hickson, Ally. “Most Workers Don't Think Women Get Paid Less Than Men — But They Do.” Refinery29. February 11, 2016. Web. April 28, 2016.
• “Pay Equity & Discrimination.” Institute For Women’s Policy Research. Web. April 28, 2016.