National Equal Pay Day, 2013

Proclamation 8955 of April 8, 2013

National Equal Pay Day, 2013

By the President of the United States of America

A Proclamation

Over the past 4 years, the American people have come
together to lift our economy out of recession and forge
a foundation for lasting prosperity. Our businesses
have created millions of new jobs, our stock market is
rebounding, and our housing market has begun to heal.
But even now, too many Americans are seeing their hard
work go unrewarded because of circumstances beyond
their control. Women--who make up nearly half of our
Nation's workforce--face a pay gap that means they earn
23 percent less on average than men do. That disparity
is even greater for African-American women and Latinas.
On National Equal Pay Day, we recognize this injustice
by marking how far into the new year women have to work
just to make what men did in the previous one.

Wage inequality undermines the promise of fairness and
opportunity upon which our country was founded. For
families trying to make ends meet, that gap can also
mean the difference between falling behind and getting
ahead. When working mothers make less than their male
counterparts, they have less to spend on basic
necessities like child care, groceries, and rent. Small
businesses see fewer customers walk through their
doors. Tuition payments get harder to afford, and rungs
on the ladder of opportunity get farther apart. And
just as diminished wages shortchange families, they
slow our entire economy--weakening growth here at home
and eroding American competitiveness abroad.

To grow our middle class and spur progress in the years
ahead, we need to address longstanding inequity that
keeps women from earning a living equal to their
efforts. That is why I have made pay equity a top
priority--from signing the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act
days after I took office to cracking down on equal pay
law violations wherever they occur. And to back our
belief in equality with the weight of law, I continue
to call on the Congress to pass the Paycheck Fairness
Act.

Our country has come a long way toward ensuring
everyone gets a fair shot at opportunity, no matter who
you are or where you come from. But our journey will
not be complete until our mothers, our wives, our
sisters, and our daughters are treated equally in the
workplace and always see an honest day's work rewarded
with honest wages. Today, let us renew that vision for
ourselves and for our children, and let us rededicate
ourselves to realizing it in the days ahead.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the
United States of America, by virtue of the authority
vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the
United States, do hereby proclaim April 9, 2013, as
National Equal Pay Day. I call upon all Americans to
recognize the full value of women's skills and their
significant contributions to the labor force,
acknowledge the injustice of wage inequality, and join
efforts to achieve equal pay.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
eighth day of April, in the year of our Lord two
thousand thirteen, and of the Independence of the
United States of America the two hundred and thirty-
seventh.