The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which affirms that the 180-day statute of limitations for pay discrimination resets with each new discriminatory paycheck, was signed into U.S. law on January 29, 2009, by U.S. President Barack Obama.
The law was ratified in reaction to Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., a U.S. Supreme Court pronouncement holding that the statute of limitations for filing an equal-pay lawsuit starts at the date the pay was agreed upon, not at the date of the most recent paycheck, as a lower court had ruled. This prevented lawsuits by plaintiffs who claimed continuing pay discrimination but who did not find out it until years after the discrimination began.
What could be bad about a law like this? After all, we should not have pay discrimination anyway. Whether you are a women, man, white, black, hispanic, jew, this should not matter. Your pay should be based on meritocracy. So, Bioelectric impedance why are the Republicans against the passing of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act?
Mr. John McCain is "all in favor of pay equity for women, but this kind of legislation, as is typical of what's being proposed by my friends on the other side of the aisle, opens us up to lawsuits for all kinds of problems...This is government playing a much, much greater role in the business of a private enterprise system." Well, so the problem is that government is playing a greater role in private industry. I have at least one problem with that statement. If government had not played a bigger role in private industry in the nineteenth century, African Americans might very well be slaves today.
Let's see what some other Republicans said: "A trial lawyer bailout!" exclaimed Sen. Lamar Alexander, "The timing of this proposal is atrocious," Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, said. Mr Bennett went on to talk about how passing this bill would look away from the economic consequences. How about the economic consequence of potentially thousands if not millions of employees getting the shaft on their wages?
Let's for fun play a little game. Let us take set an appointment calendar aside to chronicle the number of frivolous lawsuits that come out of the Lilly Ledbetter Act over the next year or so and see if the Republicans are right. Maybe, just me we can gain further insight into our political system and the veracity of our parties' statements.
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