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Statement of NOW President Kim Gandy

Cutting funds to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is like taking a homeless person's coat in the middle of winter -- making an already bad situation much worse. But cutting funds is exactly what the Bush administration's 2007 budget proposes to do.

Who will bear the cold brunt of those cuts? Women, people of color, people with disabilities, religious minorities, seniors -- people for whom the EEOC is often the only source of redress for unlawful discrimination or harassment at work.

It is unacceptable that wage discrimination against women has persisted for decades, with women working full-time, year-round, currently averaging 77 percent of what men are paid, and women of color making much less. It is inexcusable that in order to fight discrimination, employees are faced with high costs of litigation as well as the likelihood that corporate defendants are financially able to drag their cases on for years.

We need an EEOC that isn't threadbare -- one that will enforce the protections guaranteed by the Equal Pay Act of 1963 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In 2005, 63 percent of the 75,428 filings at EEOC offices were based on race or sex discrimination, including sexual harassment. In the past decade, pregnancy discrimination claims have risen 31 percent. These numbers are indisputable evidence that this country requires a fully resourced and powerful entity that can be trusted with the responsibility to respond to the still-pervasive threats to equality.

Fighting these threats is crucial -- not only for the protection of the women who make up nearly half of the U.S. workforce -- but also for the economic stability of the country. If wage discrimination against women were eliminated tomorrow, the poverty rate would be cut in half.

We urge Congress to take leadership in this critical arena, restoring lost jobs and funding, and putting an end to efforts to the Bush administration's efforts to privatize the agency's services and close the area offices that handle a large share of race and sex discrimination charges.

The paid workforce is still a cold place for women and people of color, and we need the protection of a fully-funded and stable agency to enforce the law. It's only right.

Contact Information :
Mai Shiozaki
Tel : 202-628-8669, ext. 116
Cell 202-641-1906