Editorial: Equal pay

President Obama advanced workplace rights a year ago when he signed legislation making it possible for more employees to challenge unlawful pay discrimination.

Congress should take the next step and pass the Paycheck Fairness Act.

The measure would toughen laws to assure fair treatment for all workers, particularly women shortchanged of equal pay for equal work. In particular, it would allow wronged workers to seek punitive damages as well as back pay.

Congress has been slowly peeling back the damage from a 2007 Supreme Court ruling against an Alabama woman who filed suit years after being paid less than her male counterparts.

While finding that Lilly Ledbetter had been the victim of pay discrimination, the high court ruled that she'd waited too long to make her allegations. A $3 million judgment against her employer, Goodyear, for back pay and damages was tossed out.

Ledbetter was a supervisor at a Goodyear plant when she learned she earned less than any male supervisor. She also got smaller raises than her male coworkers for doing the same job.

Obama agreed that the case was egregious and restored a key workers' right when he signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, his first major piece of legislation. The measure reversed the Supreme Court ruling and relaxed the statute of limitations for reporting pay discrimination.

The legislation has eased the legal path for employees to file pay-discrimination lawsuits based on gender.

Despite gains to narrow the pay gap, women on average make 77 cents for every dollar earned by men. In 1963, women were paid 59 cents for every dollar paid to men. The disparity is even wider for women of color.

The proposed legislation picks up where the Ledbetter bill left off. Among other things, it would lift the cap on damages that currently limit awards in most cases to back pay. It would also make it tougher for employers to hide behind frivolous defenses and require stronger evidence that any pay difference is based on a "factor other than sex."

Congress should further tighten wage disparity laws to ensure fair treatment for all workers.