Statement by the President

Today, the Minnesota Legislature took action to increase the state minimum wage, giving more hardworking Minnesotans the raise they deserve. With this important step, Minnesota joins a growing coalition of states, cities, counties and businesses that have taken action to do the right thing for their workers and their citizens. I commend the state legislature for raising their minimum wage and we look forward to Governor Dayton signing the bill into law soon.  I urge Congress to follow Minnesota’s lead, raise the federal minimum wage, and lift wages for 28 million Americans.  Congress should listen to the majority of Americans who say it’s time to give America a raise and help ensure that no American who works full time has to raise a family in poverty.

Readout of the Vice President’s Meetings on Workforce Development and Job-Driven Training

As part of Vice President Biden’s ongoing work to improve America’s training programs, the Vice President hosted a conference call today with National Governors Association (NGA) leadership to discuss workforce development and job-driven training. The Vice President highlighted the importance of giving America’s workers opportunities to acquire skills they need to pursue in-demand jobs and careers. The Vice President also highlighted innovative efforts in states across the country that have proven successful, and encouraged the governors to expand on these efforts in their roles as state executives and leaders of the NGA. The Vice President was joined on today’s call by Governor Fallin of Oklahoma, Governor Hickenlooper of Colorado, Governor Beshear of Kentucky, and Governor Sandoval of Nevada.
 
The Vice President also dropped by a meeting today at the White House with entrepreneurs and leaders from information technology companies to discuss the importance of ensuring that our training efforts teach skills that are in demand by employers. The Vice President encouraged the leaders to increase job-driven training by supporting efforts to promote partnerships with training organizations and community colleges; define common skills, credentials, and standards that workers need to get middle class jobs; and increase the number of apprenticeship programs.
 
The Vice President’s meetings today are part of his ongoing work with private companies, non-profit organizations, federal agencies, education institutions, state and local leaders, and others across the country to make the workforce and training system more job-driven, integrated, and effective.

Readout of the Vice President’s Meeting with Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic of Montenegro

Vice President Biden met today with Montenegrin Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic at the White House.  Vice President Biden praised Montenegro as a valuable partner to the United States and contributor to peace and security in the region.  The two leaders discussed developments in the Balkans as well as concerns about continued Russian pressure on Ukraine.  The Vice President welcomed the strong progress Montenegro has made in meeting the requirements for NATO membership and expressed steadfast U.S. support for Montenegro’s Euro-Atlantic aspirations.  He encouraged the Prime Minister to sustain its efforts in making defense, security, and rule of law reforms in order to show concrete achievements in advance of the 2014 NATO summit in Wales.  In this context, the Vice President stressed the importance of robust efforts to strengthen democratic institutions, including an independent judiciary and a free press, as well as to protect minority rights.

FACT SHEET: Expanding Opportunity for All: Ensuring Equal Pay for Women and Promoting the Women’s Economic Agenda

When women succeed, our families succeed and America succeeds. President Obama believes that ensuring that women earn equal pay for equal work is essential to improving the economic security of our families and the growth of our middle class and our economy.  Women compose nearly half of the American workforce – yet, according to the latest U.S. Census statistics, on average, full-time working women still earn 77 cents to every dollar earned by men. 

The first piece of legislation that the President signed into law after taking office was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which empowers women to recover wages lost to discrimination by extending the time period in which an employee can file a claim.  Yet a central challenge that remains to enforcing equal pay laws is that many women do not even know that they are underpaid, and therefore cannot take steps to ensure equal pay for equal work.  

That’s why the President is taking two new executive actions to help combat pay discrimination and strengthen enforcement of equal pay laws:

• The President is signing an Executive Order prohibiting federal contractors from retaliating against employees who choose to discuss their compensation.  The Executive Order does not compel workers to discuss pay, nor does it require employers to publish or otherwise disseminate pay data – but it does provide a critical tool to encourage pay transparency, so workers have a potential way of discovering violations of equal pay laws and are able to seek appropriate remedies.
• In addition, the President is signing a Presidential Memorandum instructing the Secretary of Labor to establish new regulations requiring federal contractors to submit to the Department of Labor summary data on compensation paid to their employees, including data by sex and race.  The Department of Labor will use the data to encourage compliance with equal pay laws and to target enforcement more effectively by focusing efforts where there are discrepancies and reducing burdens on other employers.

This week, the Senate is considering the Paycheck Fairness Act, which the President believes Congress must pass to ensure the standards put forward by the executive order he will sign are applied to all employers covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act.  The President is using the power of his pen to act where he can on this issue, and will continue to urge Congress to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act to ensure all employers are held to the same high standard working women deserve.

Building on Progress

Since day one, President Obama has been laser-focused on ensuring women have the fundamental rights they deserve when it comes to earning a fair and equal wage. 

For example, President Obama has fought for an increase in the national minimum wage, including signing an executive order that will raise the minimum wage to $10.10 for federal contract workers.  Raising the national minimum wage would give millions of hard working Americans a raise and would especially benefit women:

• While women account for about half of the workforce, 55 percent of non-tipped workers benefiting from increasing the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour are women – and women are even more disproportionately represented in predominantly tipped occupations.
• Women account for a higher concentration of workers in low-wage sectors of the labor force such as food preparation, sales and personal care workers.
• Raising the minimum wage would increase the average wage among the bottom quartile of female workers by 93 cents (from $8.78), compared to 60 cents (from $9.65) for the bottom quartile of male workers.      

Women are the primary breadwinners in 40 percent of U.S. households but are bringing home 23 percent less than their male counterparts – which means less for families’ everyday needs, less for investments in our children’s futures, and, when added over a lifetime of work, substantially less for retirement.   And the pay gap is significantly greater for women of color, with African-American women earning 64 cents and Latinas earning 56 cents for every dollar earned by a Caucasian man. That is why the Obama Administration is:

• Combating pay discrimination.  The President made the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act the first bill he signed into law, which extended the time period in which claimants can bring pay discrimination claims and enabled countless victims of pay discrimination to seek redress where they otherwise could not. 
• Created a National Equal Pay Task Force.  In 2010, the President created the National Equal Pay Task Force to crack down on violations of equal pay laws.  Under this Administration, the government has strengthened enforcement, recovered substantial monetary recoveries, and made critical investments in education and outreach for both employers and employees. 
• Promoting the Paycheck Fairness Act.  The President continues to call on Congress to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act, commonsense legislation that would give women additional tools to fight pay discrimination.
• Encouraging State Paid Leave Initiatives. In addition, the President’s Budget provides support for States that are considering establishing paid leave programs, as California, New Jersey and Rhode Island have done.
• Leveraging Technology to Close the Pay Gap.  DOL, in conjunction with the Equal Pay Task Force, launched the “Equal Pay App Challenge” and invited software developers to create applications that provide greater access to pay data, deploy interactive tools for early career coaching or online mentoring, or disseminate data to help inform pay negotiations.  The winning teams created tools that (1) provide easy access to U.S. wage estimates by city, state and job title, empowering employees or applicants for employment with reliable and specific compensation information to support informed salary negotiations; and (2) supply users with current wage data and interview, resume and negotiation tools, as well as connect users to relevant social networks.
• Expanding the EITC for Childless Workers. The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is a proven tool to increase and reward work among low-income families with children.  However, childless workers – including noncustodial parents – can receive only up to $500 and must be at least 25 years old, so the credit does little to encourage work, particularly during the crucial years at the beginning of a young person’s career. The President has proposed doubling the maximum credit to $1,000, raising the income eligibility standard so the credit is available to a full-time minimum wage worker, and lowering the age limit from 25 to 21. The proposed expansion would be fully paid for within his budget and would benefit 13.5 million workers, including 6.1 million women.