ms. mikulski: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. ms. mikulski: madam president, i rise today to speak on paycheck fairness, the bill that we will be voting on tomorrow in the united states senate. during the next hour, 11 women -- 11 democratic women will be coming to the floor to speak. i ask -- but i'm not going to introduce each one. we want to get right to the issue rather than flowerily talk about each other; we want to talk about the need for paycheck

fairness. so i ask unanimous consent that each woman speak up to five minutes each. the presidinthe presiding offict objection. ms. mikulski: but i'm the lead-off speaker, and, madam president, i want to be very clear. why are we on the senate floor? we believe that women need a fair shot to get equal pay for equal work. we want the same pay for the same job, and we want it in our law books and we want it in our checkbooks. we want to finish the job that we began with lilly ledbetter five years ago. five years ago one of the first bills passed during the obama administration was that we passed the lilly ledbetter bill which reopened the courthouse door to women who wanted to seek redress for the way they were treated unequally in the workplace. but we need to finish the job, and that's what paycheck fairness does.

what does finish the job mean? well, right now in the united states of america there is a veil of secrecy, a veil of secrecy. and where is it? in the workplace. right now in many companies and businesses, employees are forbidden to talk about the pay that they receive with another employee. the other thing is in many places when an employer seeks redress, she's retaliated against. and last but not at all least, there are loopholes that many employers use to justify women paying less. they invite -- they invent excuses and they call them business necessity explanations. well, we're on the floor today to say we want to end the soft bigotry of low -- the low wages for women.

equal pay for equal work. no secrecy, no retaliation, no loopholes, no way. today is the day for equal pay. we're on the floor today because it is the equal pay day. and what does that mean? it means the women of the united states of america have to work in many instances 15 months a year, or 15 months to earn what a man makes doing the same job, with the same experience and the same seniority, earns in one year. now we're not against the guys. there are many men who do jobs they hate so their daughters can have the jobs they love. and after working to ensure they have a good home and a good education, they see their daughters are paid less. and we all know there is a generalized suppression going on

of the middle class. another topic and another debate. but right now we're on the job, and we want to be paid for what we do. it's hard to believe that women are almost half of the workforce, and yet during that time, as we make up 50% of the workforce, we still make only 77 cents for every $1 that a man makes. african-american women earn 62 cents. latino women 54 cents. almost half. this is a disgrace. we need to change the law, and that's what we seek to do by bringing the paycheck fairness up. now, our president has tried to do his part. he supported the lilly ledbetter bill, and today we were at the white house where he took an executive order step to ban retaliation against employees who work for federal contractors. so we're going to start being a

model employer by banning retaliation not only within the federal government, but with our federal contractors. he also then called upon the contractors to submit data information so that we would know what are the gender differences that are going on on the very contracts that we have. when we signed the equal pay act, it was in 1963 under lyndon johnson. women made only 59 cents. now you know what? that's 50 years ago. in 50 years ago, we've gained 18 cents. 18 cents. well, that's not the way to go. the way to go is to pass the paycheck fairness act. what we will do is to make sure that, as i said, no retaliation, no excuses. you know, we hear this all the

time. oh, the guys do harder jobs. they're a breadwinner. so many women now are heading up households, are single breadwinners themselves. and no longer will limited -- the other important thing is no longer will women be limited to pay, just back pay when they're being discriminated against. my time's up? well, madam president, my time is up. i am so into this bill. i've been at this legislation a long time, but what i would like now is help. hope and help is on the way. reenforcements are here. and now i turn to senator elizabeth warren, and then after that senator claire mccaskill. and senator cantwell in that order. and i'll call others. senator warren.

ms. warren: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. ms. warren: i come to the floor today in support of equal pay for equal work. i honestly can't believe that we are still arguing over equal pay in 2014. congress first moved to solve this problem more than 50 years ago. when the equal pay act was signed into law in 1963, women were earning 59 cents on the dollar for every dollar earned by a man. today women earn only 77 cents on the dollar for what a man earns. women are taking a hit in nearly every occupation. bloomberg census data found immediate kwr-pb income for -- median income for women were lower than for men in 264 out of 265 major occupation categories. in 99.6% of all occupations, men

get paid more than women. 99.6%. that's not an accident. that's discrimination. the effects of this discrimination are real and they are long lasting. young women, for example, borrow roughly the same amount of money as young men to pay for college. but according to the american association of university of women, these women make only 82 cents on the dollar compared with men one year after graduating. so women take out the same loans to go to college, but they face an even steeper road to repay those loans. unequal pay also means a tougher retirement. the average woman in massachusetts who collects social security will receive about $3,000 less each year than a similarly situated man because the benefits are tied to how much people earn while they are working. there's a problem, a big problem, and women are fed up. 50 years, and women still can't

earn the same as a man for doing the same work. women are ready to fix it, but it isn't easy. today some women can be fired just for asking the guy across the hall how much money he makes. earlier today the president issued executive orders to stop federal contractors from retaliating against women who ask about their pay and to instruct the department of labor to collect better data for the gender pay gap. and good for him, and good for women working for federal contractors. now the u.s. congress should extend these protections to all women. the senate will soon vote on the paycheck fairness act. this is a commonsense proposal. no discrimination, no retaliation when women ask how much the guys are getting paid. and basic data to tell us how much men and women are getting paid for key jobs. so there it is. it's basic protection, basic information, a fair shot.

that's essentially what this bill does. and sure, sometimes men will be paid more than women. employers can still make different payments for salaries based on factors like skill, performance, expertise, seniority, and so forth. and the paycheck fairness act doesn't touch any of that. it simply provides the tools that women need to make sure that salary differences have something to do with the actual job they're doing and not just the fact that they are women. several states have already adopted a similar rule, and businesses continue to thrive without any explosion of lawsuits. this bill is about good business, a level playing field for men and women, an equal chance to get the job done, a fair shot for all of us. america's women are tired of hearing that pay inequality isn't real. we're tired of hearing that somehow it's our fault.

and we're ready to fight back against pay discrimination. i thank senator mikulski and all of my colleagues for speaking on the floor today, for their leadership on this important proposal. and i urge the senate to pass the paycheck fairness act to strengthen america's middle class families and to level the playing field for hardworking women. madam president, i yield. mrs. mccaskill: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from missouri. mrs. mccaskill: you know, madam president, every once in a while it is probably a healthy thing for all of us to sit back for a moment and reflect on why we're here. what is the united states senate supposed to be about? why do we come to the senate? why did our founding fathers lay out a constitution that had these branches of government, and in the branch of government that we reside in, we are called

the legislative branch. so what is that about? i think what the founding fathers wanted us to do is to make our laws reflect the values and priorities of the american people. and the paycheck fairness act is a simple step towards making our laws reflect two of the most important values we have in the united states of america. i guarantee you if i walked up to any of my colleagues that intend to vote against this and said do you believe in equality and justice, they would say of course we believe in equality and justice. then why would you not support this legislation? because it is just that simple. we are just trying to make the laws of this country reflect the american ideals of equality and

justice. well, they say there are laws on the books. well, here's the deal. you can't get justice if you don't have the facts. if the facts are as secret, a protected secret, then justice is always going to be elusive and equality is going to be something we give lip service to, not something we will truly enjoy in this country. so this is just a step to say to american businesses, let us understand why two people making the same job have two different levels of pay. explain it to us. what is so evil about that? what is so evil about expecting a business to be able to explain why a man and a woman with the same experience, the same credentials and the same work output are paid differently?

if there is a good reason, then there is no litigation. there is no rush to the courthouse. but if there is not a good reason, that's where that justice comes in. that's where a woman has an opportunity to go into the hallowed halls of our courts, the envy of the world, i might add, to have a fair shot at justice. and the notion that someone could be fired for trying to get the facts about their own compensation. the notion that retaliation would somehow be embraced by my colleagues that don't intend to vote for this legislation. now i know they are trying to explain to the american people this has something to do with us having a love affair with america's trial lawyers. i have never heard more rubbish

in my life. it's not the trial lawyers that we care about. it's the women. it's the single moms. it's the women that have this sinking feeling in the pit of their stomach that they're getting paid less but they're helpless because they can't get at the information, and when they do, they have the entire burden of proof of showing that somehow they weren't inferior for their male -- to their male colleague. there is no absolute possible reason that any of us would be trying to help lawyers with this. it's their clients, guys. it's the women of america. it is the women of america that want the laws to reflect our values of equality and justice. this is a simple step.

it is nothing to be afraid of. frankly, the only thing anyone who opposes this bill should be afraid of is the wrath of american women across this country that are sick and tired of being told it's none of their business what they're getting paid, it's none of their business what their colleague is getting paid, and by the way, i don't have to explain to you why you make less even though your work output has been superior to your male colleagues. it's time, and it's just about our values. thank you, madam president. i yield the floor. ms. cantwell: thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from washington. ms. cantwell: thank you, madam president. i'd like to join my colleagues and thank the senator from missouri for her statement as somebody who has been involved in basically making sure the law is implemented and upheld, too. i appreciate her views on this. and i want to thank senator mikulski for her leadership in advocating for equal pay for equal work. she has been a champion in this for many years and she is

insistent now that we pass this legislation, and that's why we're here, because we want to make sure that our colleagues understand how important it is to pass the paycheck fairness act. i encourage my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support this legislation and end the discrimination that many women face in america. this is a critical issue, not just to women but to men because obviously the households of america deserve to have both people making equal pay, and the message from the american people is clear. they want congress to focus on the most important economic issues of the day. that is, jobs and certainly having a job that pays you equally for the work that you do to your co-workers is critically important. the paycheck fairness act is exactly what we should be working on, ways to strengthen the pocketbook of many americans. while we have made progress over the last five decades as we passed the equal pay act, we still have a long way to go. in my state, the state of

washington, women are paid 78 cents for every dollar that men earn for the same work. that amounts to an average wage gap of $11,000 per year. the truth is that many women are the breadwinners in their families, and they should be paid as breadwinners. they should not face discrimination. today women make up 48% of the work force in the state of washington, and these families are very important to our economy. on average, mothers in washington provide 41% of their household income and nationally 40% of women are the sole primary breadwinners for their households. so this is an important issue for our economy. just think of the boost they would get, the boost that we would see if they were paid equally. right now, one-third of those families headed by women in washington live in poverty, so closing the wage gap means that they would be able to afford 82

more weeks of food, according to the partnership for women and families. it would mean better economic freedom. it would mean the ability to buy more essentials. it means their families would be better off. but more importantly, people need to realize that not only does this pay gap affect women's ability to support a family, also the pay gap reduces their ability to save for the future. from around the age of 35 through retirement, women are typically paid about 75% to 80% of what men are paid, and over their lifetime, a woman in washington will earn $500,000 less than her male counterpart. that's money that can be saved and invested for the future, so we must pass the paycheck fairness act to end this disparity because this act will require employers to provide justification other than gender for paying men higher wages than women for the exact same job, it

protects employees who share that information with others from being retaliated against, and it provides victims of pay discrimination with the same remedies available to victims of other discrimination, including punitive and compensation damages. so this is important legislation. it is important legislation that will end the discrimination that women are seeing in the workplace. the paycheck fairness act will also help eliminate the pay gap to help these families that are struggling in our economy, but just in case people get the wrong idea about this, i want to make sure people are clear. even in fields like engineering, computer science, women earn on average only 75% of their male counterparts. a woman with a master's degree will only make 70 cents for every dollar of her equally educated male counterparts. it's time the senate ends the pay discrimination by passing

the paycheck fairness act. that's why i have been happy to sponsor this legislation and work with my colleagues. i want young women growing up today to know that this is not an issue they are going to have to deal with in the future. they will get equal pay. so i thank my colleagues. i hope my colleagues on the other side of the aisle will help us in invoking cloture and providing the votes we need to pass the paycheck fairness act. i thank the president. i yield the floor. mrs. gillibrand: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from new york. mrs. gillibrand: i am proud to join this fight for paycheck fairness, an effort led by the dean of the women in the senate, the first democratic woman ever elected to the senate in her own right and the longest serving woman in congress today, senator barbara mikulski. this is the same fight many of our own mothers and grandmothers fought for -- equal pay for equal work. the promise made by the equal pay act 50 years ago literally

half a century ago continues to be broken every similar day in this country, and when that happens, it doesn't just hold back women individually, it holds back entire families. it holds back the entire american economy. today, women make up more than half of america's population and nearly half the work force. women are outearning men in college degrees and advanced degrees and are a growing share of primary household earners, but to this day, men are still outearning women for the exact same work. on average, women earn 77 cents for every dollar a man earns and even less for women of color. african-american women earn 69 cents on the dollar and latinas earn just 58 cents on the dollar. in the years leading to the equal pay act, only about 11% of families rely on women as the

primary wage earner for kids under 18, just 11%. today, 40% of primary or sole wage earners are women. 40% of families with kids under 18 that rely on women to pay the bills, balance the family finances, make the tough choices at the kitchen table and provide for their kids, but you would not know this by looking at america's workplace policies. they are stuck in the past. they are stuck in the madmen era. congress and state capitols have failed to keep up the face of the modern american workplace. this has to change. how can two-income families and sole female bread winning households -- bread-winning households get ahead when they are shortchanged every single month? if we wouldn't a growing economy and a thriving middle class, pay women fairly.

it's really that simple. when women earn equal pay, america's g.d.p. could grow by up to 4%. it's common sense, it's the right thing to do to strengthen our economy, to strengthen our families. so today on equal payday, let's get this done. let's pass the paycheck fairness act and give america's women the fair shot they deserve to earn their way ahead in today's economy. ms. klobuchar: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from minnesota. ms. klobuchar: i'm a cosponsor of the paycheck fairness act, an incredibly important bill. i'm proud to be here with my colleagues and the leader of the senate, senator mikulski. today is equal payday, but it also marks the day when things are warming up in my state. after a long deep freeze, it looks like we will have 70 degrees. the snow will melt, the flowers

will bloom, and i think the message we're all here to bring is it's time to stop freezing the women of america out of this economy. the women of america want to be treated fairly. right now, all the work we're doing, whether it's the unemployment bill for unemployment compensation, it is stuck somewhere in a deep freeze over in the house of representatives, somewhere between the frozen peas and the chocolate ice cream, and it's time to thaw out the freezer in washington, d.c., and help the women of america. that is what this bill is about. that is what the minimum wage bill is about. people deserve a fair shot at the american dream. i'd like to thank again senator mikulski and i'd like to thank her for her leadership with the lilly ledbetter fair pay act. in 2009, we passed that bill to make sure that workers who face pay discrimination based on gender, race, age, religion, disability or national origin have access to the court. in doing so, we restore the

original intent of the civil rights act and the equal pay act. now it's time to prevent that pay discrimination from happening in the first place. we all know women have made great strides in this economy. we have made great strides in this body. we now have 20 women in the united states senate, but of course we are still only at 20%. the fortune 500 now has 23 women c.e.o.'s, but i still think that anyone who looks at this knows that there are great strides that have been made but great progress ahead, and despite all this progress, women in this country still only earn close to 80 cents for every dollar made by men. this pay gap has real consequences for american families. two-thirds of today's families rely on a mother's income either in part or in entirety, and in more than one-third of families, the mother is the main breadwinner. as senate chair of the joint economic committee, we released

a report this week that shows that lower wages impact women all throughout their working lives, and i think that's something people don't always think about. the fact that if you consistently make less money and then you retire and you're actually going to live longer than men, you have a lot less money to retire with in the first place. in fact, women who retire have about $11,000 less per year than men have. that is pretty significant when you look at the age range where women will be in retirement. the other piece of this that we don't always think about, unless you're in the position, is women in the sandwich generation, women who are taking care of aging parents at the same time they are taking care of children. that is happening every single day in this country as women are having to take leaves from work or leave their job to take care of an aging parent while they are still struggling to afford to send their kids to college, to send their kids to daycare. this legislation, madam chair,

will build on the promises of the equal pay act and the lilly ledbetter fair pay act. it will give women new tools and protections to guard against pay discrimination and will help reaffirm that basic principle that all women deserve equal pay for equal work. i'm hopeful that we can get this done for the people of this country. it was the late senator paul wellstone of minnesota that said we all do better when we all do better. i still believe that's true, and so do my colleagues who join me today. we need to focus on this bill. we need to unfreeze some old beliefs, and we need to bring a little spring into the united states senate. thank you, madam president. i yield the floor. mrs. boxer: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from california. mrs. boxer: madam president, senator mikulski and i were just whispering to each other about how far we've come since the day that anita hill came to the hill

and we couldn't really do much to help her, but we organized and recognized that women had to be here in numbers sufficient to make a difference, and clearly today we are. my colleague, senator mikulski, is our dean of the women, and all she is basically saying here, with all of us as an echo chamber, is this -- women deserve a fair shot. it's long past time for us to stop shortchanging half of the country and their families. i want to show you a chart that looks at what happens to a woman in a year when she gives up $11,000 because she is not being paid for the same job the same amount a man is. what could that $11,000 do? she could buy a year of groceries, madam president. she could provide a year of

rent, a year of daycare. she could buy a used car. she could afford community college. that's one year. look at what happens over the course of a lifetime. when because a woman is not getting her fair share, the equal amount she deserves, only 70 cents on the dollar, over her lifetime, it's $443,000. what could she do with that? pay off her entire mortgage. send three kids to the university of california. a great school, i might say. buy 8,000 tanks of gas. what's the point of this? it's to show that the dollars that the women are not getting could be going into the community, could be making sure their families are taken care of, would make all the difference in the world. now, i was a little startled to see some of my republican friends on the other side of the aisle and the other side, the

the house, republican members of the house say this is demeaning to women. this is what i got out of the news report. women don't need this. well, would they have said that children, that children need protection against child labor, and the answer is yes. did workers need protection from a 14-hour day when they were being exploited? yes. did we need to make sure people in hazardous workplaces like chemical companies have appropriate protective gear? yes. did we need to make sure there are fire exits in a crowded factory after a horrific fire called the triangle fire? yes? now we need to make sure that women get equal pay for equal work. it's just part of the continuing of bending that arc of history toward justice. that's what's happening here with the leadership of senator

mikulski and all of us standing on her shoulders. and i have to say it's a great day, it's a great day to hear my colleagues come here to the floor and speak as one. we are speaking not only for the women of america who make up more than half but for their families. that's the point. two-thirds of women are either the sole head of households or they share in providing for the economic well-being of their families. this is a matter of justice. it's a matter of fairness. it's a matter of a fair shot and i am proud to stand with my colleagues, and i hope and i hope and pray that we will get the 60 votes necessary. there's a filibuster going on, as usual. we need a supermajority. but i'd say to my colleagues on the other side, too many women have to be superwomen so you can give them a supermajority. superjim.

not one job but two jobs. so please help us. let's celebrate tomorrow with a great vote and i yield the floor. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from washington. mrs. murray: thank you, madam president. i want to start my bye expressing my thanks and appreciation to senator mikulski for her once again tremendous leadership in the fight for equal pay and foe bringing the paycheck fairness act to the forefront of the debate this session. the role of women in families and in our economy has really shifted dramatically over the last few decades. today, 60% of families rely on earnings from both parents. that's up from 37% in 1975. 60%. women today make up nearly half the work force. and more than ever women are likely to be the prime mayor -- primary breadwinner in their families. women are making a difference in our economy, in lecture halls

and small businesses. but despite the important progress we have made, since the equal pay act passed now 50 years ago including passing the lily ledbetter act thanks again to senator mikulski in 2009 to give more women tools to fight pay discrimination, women's wages not have caught up with the times. across the country today, women still earn 77 cents on the dollar on average to do the exact same work as men. it would take a typical woman until today to earn what a man would earn the same work in this year in 2013. and that difference really adds up. in seattle in my home state last year women earned 73 cents on the dollar. 73 cents on the dollar compared to the male counterparts. that translated to a yearly gap of $16,000 -- $16,346.

nationwide, over a typical woman's lifetime pay discrimination amounts to $464,320 in lost wages. that's not just unfair to women, it is bad for our families and it's bad for our economy. at a time when more and more families rely on women's wages to put food on the table or stay in their homes or build a nest egg for retirement or help pay for their children's education, it is absolutely critical that we do more to eliminate pay discrimination and unfairness in the workplace. the paycheck fairness act would tackle pay discrimination head on. it would ramp up enforcement of equal pay laws and strengthen assistance to businesses to improve equal pay practice. i hope we can all agree that in the 21st century workers should be compensated based on how they do their jobs, not

whether they are male or female. i hope we'll be able to pass the paycheck fairness act as quickly as possible for working women and their families in this country. but, madam president, we can't stop there. we need to build then on these critical reforms with other steps towards giving women a better and a fairer shot at getting ahead. one out of four women in the united states today would benefit from raising the minimum wage. that's 15 million american women who are making the equivalent of about two gallons of gas per hour. it's clearly time to raise the minimum wage and give working women in the country some much deserved relief. and there are other ways, madam president, we can and should be updating our policies to help women and their families make ends meet. for example, thanks to our outdated tax code a woman who is thinking about reentering the work force as the second earner in her family is likely going to face higher tax rates than her

husband. that would come in addition to increased costs she would then have of child care and transportation and the possibility of losing tax credits and other benefits as her household income rises. all of this means that struggling families will experience higher tax rates than what many of the wealthiest americans pay and it can discourage a second -- potential second earner like a mom who is talking about reentering the work force from returning to her professional career. i recently introduced the 21st century worker tax cut act which would help solve this problem by giving struggling two-earner families with children a tax deduction on the second earner's income. the joint committee on taxation estimates that that change alone would cut taxes by an average of $700 for 7.3 million families next year. the 21st century worker tax

cut would also expand the eitc and lower the eligibility age for people without dependents and young workers just starting out can benefit from the credit. by the way, this has bipartisan roots. it builds on work incentives in the eitc and is paid for by getting rid of wasteful corporate tax loopholes both ways and means chairman camp and democrats agree ought to be closed. now, opinion leaders from across the political spectrum have said that this bill would provide much-needed relief to workers and families. one conservative commentator wrote in "the national review" that the 21st century worker tax cut is -- and i quote --"a serious proposal that has the potential to better lives of a large number of our workers." and a "new york times" editorial columnist said it would -- quote -- "be a huge benefit to low-income childless families and two-earner families." so i'm hopeful that here in

congress we will see similar support on both sides of the aisle for a bill that would help women and working families keep more of what they earn. we've come a long way, madam president, in terms of the opportunities women have in our country today but there is no question we have a lot more work to do. if we take these steps that i've talked about and others are here talking about, we will do much to break down the very real barriers that still exist today. we'll help working women and their families, we'll strengthen our economy and we will expand opportunity for the next generation of women who enter the work force. so i'm here today to urge my colleagues to support the paycheck fairness act and then build on that step by continuing to help level the playing field for american women and their families. thank you, madam president. and i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from maryland.

ms. mikulski: madam president, this isn't only a woman's fight though we reserved this time. there are many good men in the senate who stand shoulder to shoulder with us and i know senator -- the senator from west virginia would like to have two minutes before he presphwhriedz. i yield him two minutes. actually i should yield him 77% of what we got, but we're for equal pay and equal time as well. the presiding officer: the senator from west virginia. mr. manchin: that will be a minute and 45 seconds,, madam president. as a proud husband of a brilliant, brilliant, talented woman, my wife gale and as the father of two daughters and a grandfather of six granddaughters, all of whom are different gifted and make great contributions to our country it's past time that women earn the same men in the workplace. we need to correct this unfairness to make sure women are paid what they deserve. as we join together today to

celebrate equal pay day in the year 2014, it justifies competitiveness -- defies common sense that working women in west virginia make 70 cents to every dollar a man makes. too many families are working hard to make ends meet and smeationly in families where women are the breadwinners. in west virginia there are more than 81,000 family households headed by women. and about 30% of those families or nearly 29,200 households have incomes that fall below the poverty level. eliminating the wage gap would provide much-needed income to women whose wages put food on the table, pay the bills and maintain a respectable quality of life for their children and families. i was blessed to -- been raised by two strong hardworking women. my grandmother, known as mama k and my mother. both of these women taught me women can work just as hard if

not harder and should get paid the same as a man. as a matter of fact, they should probably get overtime. there is no wroan rhone they shouldn't have received the same pay for the same job as men then and they certainly, certainly resonates that today. since i joined the senate i'm proud to cosponsor paycheck fairness act, and the very first vote i took in the senate was for paycheck fairness. until congress passes the truly commonsense bill i will continue to fight for paycheck fairness because the bottom line is people should earn the same pay for the same work, period, no excuses. and i will say as a former governor, most of my decisionmaking was made around good, strong women who sat down and gave me the facts and nothing but the facts and i appreciated that. it shouldn't mad math whether you're a man or a woman, you should be treated fairly no matter what and no matter are where you are and no matter what you do. thank you madam chairman.

ms. mikulski: senator heitkamp. the presiding officer: the senator from north dakota. ms. heitkamp: thank you so much. i want to thank our great friend and leader from the state of maryland for continuing her hard work. i wonder if she ever wakes up in the morning and wonders when it's ever going to be done, when we'll see justice and i think she's learned over the years that until you stand up, every day, and lived that life and live a life where you're trying to make positive change in america, it doesn't doesn't get done. she is somebody who has never given up. i think it's interesting because north dakota like west virginia is one of those states where actually women earn less than men and below the national average less than men. but when you look at the national average, 77%, that is a horrible, horrible statistic. but you know what's really horrible? it's really horrible if you live that statistic. not one person in this body lives that statistic. we're all treated equally. it doesn't matter, you know,

what gender we are, if we are members of congress, we're treated equally. can you imagine what the outpouring of sympathy and support would be if we got 77% of a male salary? we would think that's atrocious. how can that possibly happen in america? but it happens every day in america. it happens every day for working women who are supporting their families, women who go to work 40, 50, 60 hours to support their families and to improve the economies of their state. and they keep spinning their wheels. they keep working at trying to change this and don't seem to get any further ahead. how many of us could take a 25% reduction in salary? and that's really what we're asking every woman in america to do. not across the board, but certainly on average. every woman in america to take a 25% reduction in their salary.

that is