In honor of Women’s Equality Day on August 26, a total of 29 companies – including many of the companies represented by women in the AWESOME network — announced they have signed on to the Obama Administration’s Equal Pay Pledge.
According to a story in the Los Angeles Times, the pledge includes a commitment “to conduct a yearly analysis of the company’s pay practices, review hiring and promotion procedures and adopt practices aimed at closing the national gap in pay between men and women.”
These newly-pledged companies join others that signed the Pledge when it was launched by the White House on June 14, Equal Pay Day, bringing the total to 56. Of those 56, 24 are companies represented in the AWESOME network. They include A.T. Kearney, Accenture, Anheuser-Busch, Apple, Cisco, Coca-Cola, CVS, Deloitte, EY, Gap, General Motors, The Hershey Company, IBM, Intel, Johnson & Johnson, L’Oreal USA, Microsoft, Nike, Patagonia, PepsiCo, PwC, Staples, Target, and Unilever.
The White House Fact Sheet describes the reason for the initiative: The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act was the first piece of legislation President Obama signed into law. Policies that ensure fair pay for all Americans and that help businesses attract the strongest talent can not only narrow the gender pay gap, but also boost productivity and benefit our economy. Yet, the typical woman working full-time all year in the United States only earns 79 percent of what a typical man working full-time all year earns. While the gap has narrowed slightly over the past few years, there is much more work to be done to ensure fair pay for all.