It’s been nearly 50 years since Pennsylvania’s equal pay law has been updated.

In honor of the national Equal Pay Day, the American Association of University Women is hosting an equal pay day rally at 2 p.m. today at the Capitol Rotunda in Harrisburg, an event that some members of the Bedford Business and Professional Women group will be attending.

Locals voiced their support for equal pay, pointing out statistics that illustrate a gender wage gap and sharing their personal experiences with unfair pay in the workforce.

Joan LaSalle, vice president of the Bedford Business and Professional Women, is one of the women who shared her experiences with unfair pay with the Mirror. “Women don’t get paid the same amount as men do for the same work,” she said.

LaSalle said she recently retired as one of the few female engineers at a Pennsylvania company that she requested not to be named.

During her more than 30 years as an engineer, LaSalle said she is certain she experienced unequal pay during two incidences, discovering that male counterparts less qualified than her made the same pay or more.

“Women have to work harder to get the same recognition,” LaSalle said.

Sharon Houck, a Breezewood resident and Trinity School of Natural Health student, said she learned her male co-workers made thousands of dollars more than her when she worked as a general manager at a company she was uncomfortable naming.

It was through her job requirement of completing audits of financial accounts that Houck discovered that some of her male counterparts in lower positions were getting paid up to $10,000 more than she was.

“The mentality around pay has to change,” Houck said. “The situation can’t stay stagnant.”

The Equal Pay Today! Campaign breaks down the wage gap between women and men by race, using median earnings of full-time, year-round workers from the 2016 survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau. According to the campaign, Asian American women make 87 cents to a man’s dollar, Caucasian women make 79 cents, African American women make 63 cents, Native American women make 57 cents and Latina women make 54 cents.

Based on these ratios, equal pay day for Asian American women fell on Feb. 22. For Caucasian women, equal pay is April 17; for African American women, it’s Aug. 7; for Native American women, it’s Sept. 27; and for Latina women, it’s Nov. 1.

The days symbolize the approximate date a woman has to work into the year on average in order to catch up to the earnings paid to a man in the last year, according to Terry Fromson, managing attorney of the Women’s Law Project, an organization that represents Pennsylvania in the Equal Pay Today! Campaign.

“Equal Pay Day was established in 1996 as a way to increase awareness at wage gaps for working people,” Fromson said. “Equal pay is a complicated issue that is about more than pay discrimination, though that is important and a good place to begin when discussing pay equity. We know how to address pay discrimination, but have not seen the political will to do so. Here in Pennsylvania, we have seen bills to fix the state’s equal pay act that would help address pay discrimination, but they are repeatedly left to die of neglect in committee.”

State Rep. Maria Donatucci, D-Philadelphia, introduced legislation to update the penalties of violators of Pennsylvania’s equal pay law back in March 2017.

Her memo to the House of Representatives states the equal pay law and its penalties have not been updated for decades. The law was enacted in 1959 and was last amended in 1968. Donatucci proposes increasing fines for employers who violate the law from the current $50 to $200 per day of violation to between $2,500 to 5,000 per day of violation.

The proposed legislation, House Bill 830, would also increase the time period tht an employee can file legal action from two years of the violation date to three years.

“If you have a pension, it’s less money when you have less pay,” Donatucci said. “Your Social Security is less when your pay is less. So this affects not only a woman while she’s working, but it affects her when she tries to retire or in her old age.”

“It’s time for us to do something,” Donatucci said, adding she has a daughter whom she wants to see receive equal pay. “This is happening, and it’s not acceptable. I think awareness is everything.”

There has been no further action on the legislation since its introduction.

Donna Gority, president of ArtsAltoona and a member of the Business and Professional Women of Pennsylvania, said the local women’s leadership group in particular has lobbied for equal pay over the years.

“We still have a long way to go,” Gority said, noting progress made over the years.

Gority served as the first female commissioner for Blair County from 1984-2012, and said elected officials are paid the same. But while working as a commissioner, she noticed female dominated positions in government departments were initially way lower than similar positions held by men and worked to adjust pay wages.

“But it’s still pretty much true that the female dominated positions are still somewhat lower than somewhat similar positions held by men,” Gority said. Continuing to raise awareness, using formulas to set job pay rates and holding “employers’ feet to the fire” are some solutions for the gender wage gap, according to Gority.

In both incidences of unequal pay, LaSalle said she was able to advocate for fairer pay by addressing her supervisors.

“I feel strongly that women need to stand up for themselves and each other and not just wait for legislation to pass,” LaSalle said.

Mirror Staff Writer Shen Wu Tan is at 946-7457.