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Kamala Harris Vows To Punish Companies For The Gender Wage Gap

   DailyWire.com

Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA) announced Monday her plan to close the gender “wage” gap, which Democrats claim is due to mass discrimination against women.

In reality, there is no “wage” gap, but there is an “earnings” gap due to the different careers and hours women work vs. men. Every economist who has studied the gap has found this same answer, yet Democrats continue to claim America’s employers are committing discrimination against women en masse. Also, paying men more than women has been illegal since the Equal Pay Act became law in 1963.

Harris’ plan would require companies to report information about their pay policies and the pay of men and women in the company. They would also be required to spend time “applying for a mandatory ‘Equal Pay Certification’ from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission,” the Associated Press reported. Under Harris’ plan, if a company fails to receive this certification, it “would be fined 1% of their profits for every 1% wage gap they allow to persist for work of equal value.”

“Kamala Harris has a simple message for corporations: Pay women fairly or pay the price,” the campaign said in a statement announcing the plan.

“We’ve let corporations hide their wage gaps, but forced women to stand up in court just to get the pay they’ve earned. It’s time to flip the script and finally hold corporations accountable for pay inequality in America,” the campaign added.

Nothing in Harris’ announcement suggests that companies would be fined if women were found to be paid more than men for comparable work. In March, Google released the results of an internal company study that found men were being paid less than women for the same work at a higher rate than women were being paid less than men. After the study, Google provided $9.7 million to employees who were affected by the gap — with a majority of the money going to men.

Would Google be required to pay the government 1% of their profits for every 1% wage gap that benefits women? The Harris campaign has so far not responded to a Daily Wire inquiry.

That’s not all Harris’ plan would do, according to the AP:

In Harris’s equal-pay plan, the campaign says, companies would be prohibited from asking about prior salary history as part of their hiring process, banned from using forced arbitration agreements in employment contracts for pay discrimination matters, and would be required to allow employees to freely discuss their pay. They would also be required to report the share of women who are among the company’s top earners, the total pay and total compensation gap that exists between men and women, regardless of job titles, experience and performance.

That last part is striking, as it is a clear attempt by Harris to keep the lie of the gender “wage” gap alive. The gap compares the average or median earnings of men and women, without taking into account things like careers, hours worked, or experience. Of course there will be a gap of some kind without any of those factored in. When they are, the gap almost completely disappears and there’s no evidence that what remains is due to discrimination.

Democrats have been lying about how women are paid for decades and companies have responded. What happens if and when it’s discovered that — job to job — men are paid less than women due to the constant claims of female discrimination?

In addition to all this, Harris’ plan would also require federal contractors to close their wage gap within two years or they would not be able to apply for federal contracts worth more than $500,000.

This is yet another plan designed to help women that may end up hurting them, as companies may no longer provide bonuses and raises for performance for fear of running afoul of government requirements.

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