Presidential Document2022-05797
National Equal Pay Day, 2022
Primary source
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Published
March 17, 2022
Signed
March 14, 2022
Issuing agencies
Executive Office of the President
Full Text
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<title>Federal Register, Volume 87 Issue 52 (Thursday, March 17, 2022)</title>
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[Federal Register Volume 87, Number 52 (Thursday, March 17, 2022)]
[Presidential Documents]
[Pages 15029-15030]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [<a href="http://www.gpo.gov">www.gpo.gov</a>]
[FR Doc No: 2022-05797]
Presidential Documents
Federal Register / Vol. 87, No. 52 / Thursday, March 17, 2022 /
Presidential Documents
[[Page 15029]]
Proclamation 10348 of March 14, 2022
National Equal Pay Day, 2022
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation
Equal pay is a matter of justice, fairness, and
dignity--it is about living up to our values and who we
are as a Nation. For over 25 years, Equal Pay Day has
helped draw attention to gender-based pay disparities
by highlighting how far into a new year a woman must
work, on average, to earn what a man did in the
previous year.
This year, Equal Pay Day falls on March 15, the
earliest we have ever marked the occasion. The earlier
that Equal Pay Day arrives, the closer our Nation has
come to achieving pay fairness. But while we should
celebrate the progress we have made, as I have said in
the past, we should not be satisfied until Equal Pay
Day is no longer necessary at all.
In 2020, the average woman working full-time, year-
round, for wages or a salary earned 83 cents for every
dollar paid to their average male counterpart. And once
again, the disparities are even greater for Black,
Native American, Latina, and certain subpopulations of
Asian women when compared to white men. Disabled women
also continue to experience significant disparities and
make 80 cents for every dollar compared to men with
disabilities. The pay gap reflects outright
discrimination as well as barriers that women face in
accessing good-paying jobs and meeting caregiving
responsibilities--including a lack of affordable child
care, paid family and medical leave, and fair and
predictable scheduling--which often prevent women from
joining and staying in the workforce.
Over the course of a career, the pay gap can add up to
hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost earnings,
particularly for women of color, significantly
impacting retirement savings and uniquely burdening
households led by single mothers.
The Biden-Harris Administration has moved quickly to
deliver results for women and working families and to
dismantle the barriers that women face in the
workplace. In our first full year in office, we saw the
largest calendar year decline in unemployment. We also
saw the strongest economic growth in nearly 4 decades,
rising wages, and an estimated nearly 40 percent
decline in child poverty. We have turned the tide on
women's labor force participation, which the COVID-19
pandemic had pushed to a more than 30-year low. In
addition, my Administration has taken key steps to
address pay discrimination, including issuing an
Executive Order directing the Office of Personnel
Management to take appropriate steps to advance equal
pay at Federal agencies. And I have raised the minimum
wage for Federal contractors, which has significantly
benefitted women--especially women of color--who are
disproportionately represented in minimum-wage and low-
wage jobs.
We can be proud of that progress--but there is more we
need to do. My Administration is fighting to ensure
that women have the free and fair choice to organize
and collectively bargain for the wages and benefits
they deserve and to access training for good-paying
jobs in sectors where they have historically been
underrepresented. We are working to eliminate
anticompetitive barriers that keep women from
bargaining for better pay and demanding dignity and
respect in the workplace. I have continued to call
[[Page 15030]]
on the Congress to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act,
which would help mitigate sex-based pay discrimination
while ensuring greater transparency and reporting of
disparities in wages. And I am continuing to work with
the Congress to pass critical legislation that would
lower the cost of child care, elder care, home-based
health care, and other major barriers to working
families, while raising compensation for care workers,
who are disproportionately women of color and who have
been underpaid and undervalued for far too long.
If we are going to continue our record-breaking
recovery and build a truly strong and competitive
economy for the future, we have to address the barriers
that have long held women back from full participation
and fair treatment in the workforce. The founding
promise of our Nation is that all people are created
equal--and my Administration is committed to ensuring
that all Americans have a fair and equal opportunity to
get ahead, so that one day soon we can render Equal Pay
Day a relic of the past.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR., President of
the United States of America, by virtue of the
authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws
of the United States, do hereby proclaim March 15,
2022, as National Equal Pay Day. I call upon all
Americans to recognize the full value of women's skills
and their significant contributions to the labor force,
acknowledge the injustice of wage inequality, and join
efforts to achieve equal pay.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
fourteenth day of March, in the year of our Lord two
thousand twenty-two, and of the Independence of the
United States of America the two hundred and forty-
sixth.
<GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT>
(Presidential Sig.)
[FR Doc. 2022-05797
Filed 3-16-22; 8:45 am]
Billing code 3395-F2-P
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</html>Indexed from Federal Register on March 17, 2022.
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