The Gender Pay Gap in the United States For centuries, women have been subject to many different types of inequalities. Consequently, they are subjects of disadvantages every day. From politics, economics, education, and even health care, gender inequality exists everywhere. One of the biggest problems this causes is a distribution of wealth between men and women. Even though this has been a persistent issue to date, there has been little talk of change. Critics of gender inequality are quick to place blame on the government or businesses for not hiring women, but do not suggest a way of destroying the inequality altogether. The first step of this process is to give women the equal chance of economic success as men have. This means addressing …show more content…
A study done by William R. Doyle, an assistant professor of higher education at Vanderbilt University claims, that the number of women in the workforce affects the size of the wage gap. He concludes that as the number of women in the workforce rose, therefore, the gap decreased due to more women comprising a part of the economy. Another reason that the gender wage gap got smaller over time was due to congress enacting the Equal Pay Act. This is because throughout history the government, although unsuccessfully, have tried to get rid of or lessen the gender pay gap. According to Paul Weiler a professor of law at Harvard Law school, during president Kennedy’s time in office Kennedy encountered problems with the gender pay gap and imposed a ban on it he called the Equal Pay act of 1963. However, Congress did not agree with it trying everything except following through with the ban. In the end although Congress imposed the Equal Pay act preventing companies from discriminating based on sex for same wage jobs (6). Although there has been a gradual increase in the amount that women make compared to men it is nowhere near what it should be. This is because throughout history Congress was the force that was against getting rid of the gender pay gap and therefore delayed any process that would narrow the