UFCW Women's Network
The UFCW Women's Network, founded in 1988, works to motivate and encourage women to become active in their local union so the can contribute toward building and strengthening the UFCW. More than half of the UFCW's 1.4 million members are women -- and we are a powerful resource for our union. The active participation of women members in the UFCW enhances our strength at the bargaining table, in organizing campaigns, and in the political arena.
What We Do
Thousands of Women's Network activists across the U.S. and Canada donate their time and energy to ensure the success of a wide variety of local union organizing, voter registration, educational, political, and community activities. Network members have made voter registration a priority in UFCW workplaces, reaching out especially to women and younger members who are eligible to vote for the first time.
The Women's Network also works to alert the UFCW members and the public about child labor, foreign made products, workplace violence, policies and practices of anti-union companies that undercut our economy and our communities, and the need for national health care reform.
Network members also participate in many community activities such as assisting women's shelters, teaching about labor in schools, raising money for breast cancer research, and offering scholarships for working families.
How We Work
The UFCW Women's Network is governed by an international chair, an eight-member executive committee, and regional representatives in each UFCW region. The Chair and co-chairs are elected by delegates to the Network's biennial convention.
Standing committees include: organizing, collective bargaining, education, political action, membership, communications, and diversity.
The Network shares information with members and other interested activists through Network News, which reports on Network activities on the national and regional levels.Join
Join
Get involved in the Women's Network. Download the application now (links to outside website)
Equal Pay For Equal Work--The Facts
When women get equal pay, their family incomes rise and the whole family benefits. Equal pay is about basic justice and fairness and basic family economics. More wives and more mothers work for pay than ever before, and they are working more. Their earnings are essential to family support. Pay discrimination costs women a lot but it robs husbands and families, too.
Equal pay has been the law since 1963. But today, 40 years later, women are still paid less than men, even women who have similar education, skills and experience as men.
In 2000, women were paid 73 cents for every dollar men received. That's $27 less to spend on groceries, housing, child care and other expenses for every $100 worth of work women do. Nationwide, working families lose $200 billion of income annually to the wage gap.
These figures are even worse for women of color. African American women earn only 67 cents and Latinas 58 cents for every dollar that men earn. Asian Pacific American women earn less, too.
Global Perspective
- Women make up 45 percent of the world's workforce. Yet women account for 70 percent of the world's population living in poverty.
- Women in developing countries work an average of 60 to 90 hours per week.
- Ninety percent of the 27 million workers in export processing zones are women, most of them between the ages of 16 and 25. EPZs are tax-free industrial areas for foreign companies in which labor laws often are suspended and workers unprotected.
The Union Difference
Union membership helps raise workers' pay and narrow the income gap that disadvantages minorities and women. White male union workers earn 23 percent more than nonunion white male workers, according to the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics. Their median weekly earnings for full-time wage and salary work were $967 in 2008, compared with $789 for their nonunion counterparts.
The union wage benefit is even greater for women and workers of color. Union women earn 32 percent more than nonunion women, African American union members earn 28 percent more than their nonunion counterparts, for Latino workers, the union advantage equals 43 percent and for Asian American workers, the union advantage is 6 percent.
Lilly Ledbetter
On January 29 President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act into law, making it the first legislation of his administration. The Act reversed the Supreme Court's 5-4 ruling in 2007 and restored the ability of victims of wage discrimination to challenge the practice in court.
Lilly Ledbetter wants to share this message with everyone who supported her efforts to hold Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. accountable for wage discrimination:
"For almost twenty years I was paid less than my male co-workers. My case went all the way to the Supreme Court -- I was shot down. "But President Obama signed into law the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, and told the Supreme Court that they got it wrong. I always hoped this day would come and this is the best news I have heard in a long time. "I was there with the President when he signed the bill. "I can't say thank you enough to the thousands of you who've worked with us in this fight. Your e-mails to Congress, your phone calls, and your letters of support have meant so much to me and to the movement for pay equity for all women. We knew we could count on you -- and we couldn't have done it without you. "In the months and years to come, the fight for fair pay will go on. We're still fighting to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act, and there will be other fronts in battle to close the wage gap once and for all. But we've taken an enormous step forward today. Thanks for taking that step with me." Sincerely, Lilly Ledbetter |
View the video from the signing (links to outside webpage)
See how your Senator voted (links to outside webpage)
