BILL:	A. 3637 (John)
SUBJECT:	Comparable Worth
DATE:	January 24, 2006

This legislation would amend New York State’s Labor Law, expanding the equal pay for equal work law to include equal pay for different work.

The Business Council of New York State opposes this bill because:

• Equal pay is already current law
  For over 40 years, equal pay for equal work has been and continues to be the law for both public and private employers. This issue is covered by the Equal Pay Act of 1963 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and similar state statutes. These laws have created a vigorous standard and require employers to pay male and female, minority and non- minority employees the same wages if they are doing work “substantially equal” in skill, effort, responsibility and working conditions. These existing laws already prohibit any wage differentials based on the sex or race of the employee and therefore make it unnecessary to enact a new state law, the New York State Fair Pay Act.
  
  
• Market based wages are rejected
  The theory of comparable worth rejects market involvement in the determination of pay and substitutes a so-called objective independent assessment of the “value” of the work. For example, this bill considers “...wage differentials based on varying market rates for equivalent jobs...” to be a discriminatory practice, requiring an “equivalent” job in Manhattan to be paid the same as one in Horseheads. Vast numbers of employers use market based salary and wage surveys, which include geographic differentials, industry, revenue and organization size, to price their jobs.
  
  
• Supply and Demand
  In a free market, the value of a job is determined by the supply and demand of workers in a given profession. Pay levels are the result of supply and demand. The higher the demand for the skill or service, the higher the pay and, likewise, the lower the demand, the lower the pay. All workers have the opportunity to strive for high demand jobs. Comparable worth would replace the equality of opportunity with the equality of results, using legislation and government regulation.

The concept of comparable worth has been rejected by the courts and should be rejected by you.

For these reasons, The Business Council opposes this legislation and respectfully urges that it not be enacted by the New York State Assembly.