Charting the Future of Equal Pay

Today, women workers make 78 cents when compared to men, and 66 cents for Black women, 52 cents for Latinas and 55 cents for Native women. The earnings gap is even larger when the value of benefits, including health and life insurance and performance bonuses, is included in the equation.

Disclosure of pay data by gender and race to the EEOC may pave the way for transparency to the public at large—and much-needed action to close gender and racial pay gaps once and for all. It’s been 60 years. Isn’t that long enough?

(This article originally appears in the Spring 2024 issue of Ms. Join the Ms. community today and you’ll get issues delivered straight to your mailbox!)

Beyond the Federal Budget: Hunger, Misogyny and the Absurdity of it All

Extreme House Republicans have been dangling the threat of a government shutdown for months, playing politics with the lives of real people. In addition to being disruptive, wasteful and unnecessary, a government shutdown would have a deep and scarring impact on those facing food insecurity and poverty. This is not a game.

Resistance to safety net programs like the expanded child tax credit, SNAP and WIC is rooted in racist, misogynistic, tired and offensive stereotypes that blame and shame people, rather than help them when they need it most.

Supporting Domestic Violence Survivors Means Protecting Their Options

We can and must aspire to a future in which domestic violence survivors have options beyond the civil and criminal legal systems. But in the meantime, our government leaders must protect the options that do exist.

Those existing options are largely funded by the Victims of Crime Act (VOCA) which, since its inception in 1984, has supported survivors all over the country by funding services that assist with shelter and housing access, legal representation, counseling and more via the Crime Victims Fund. But with those funds declining over time, so has available VOCA funding. And while the U.S. Department of Justice is working on a solution to this problem, any action they take won’t restart that crucial funding flow to individual states for years.

When Every Miscarriage Is a Murder Scene, Poor Women Pay the Highest Price

The Alabama Supreme Court recently shocked the nation when it held that the word “child” includes frozen embryos. Treating an embryo as the equivalent of a child upends the fertility industry, as it threatens to end in vitro fertilization (IVF) services and puts the status of embryos already in storage in serious question.

While these implications are important to untangle, the brunt of the effects of fetal personhood will fall not upon families with the resources to undergo IVF, but rather on poor and non-white women. Every decision made by a pregnant person could be second-guessed by the government. Every step outside of the most risk-averse approach to pregnancy puts the pregnant person under the microscope of the state.

Reconstructing the Roberts Court

The Supreme Court will soon make monumental decisions on presidential immunity, racial gerrymandering and abortion pills that stand to harm marginalized people and reinforce the privileges of wealth and whiteness.

Perhaps it is unremarkable that an institution dominated by white men since its inception struggles to be inclusive. But the Roberts Court’s consideration of the Reconstruction Amendments—the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments to the Constitution—is especially alarming.

Over-the-Counter Birth Control Pill Will Hit Shelves Soon

In July 2023, the FDA approved the progestin-only birth control pill, Opill, for over-the-counter access. Getting a birth control pill over the counter means that anyone (no matter their age or gender) can buy it without needing to talk to a healthcare provider or getting a prescription.

While the pharmaceutical company Perrigo announced shipment to local retailers on Monday, it may take a few weeks until you see Opill on store shelves near you.

War on Women Report: Anti-Abortion Group Tracks Planned Parenthood Visits; Texas Man Will Spend Five Months in Jail for Slipping Pregnant Wife Abortion Pill

U.S. patriarchal authoritarianism is on the rise, and democracy is on the decline. But day after day, we stay vigilant in our goals to dismantle patriarchy at every turn. The fight is far from over. We are watching, and we refuse to go back. This is the War on Women Report.

Since our last report: Modern surveillance tools pose an increasing threat to pregnant people and those helping them access care; a groundbreaking study proving the safety and effectiveness of telehealth abortion; in rare bipartisan move, Congress expanded the child tax credit for the next three years, lifting 400,000 children above the poverty line by 2025; rest in power, Nex Benedict; and more.

Subminimum Wage Is a Legacy of Slavery: Time for One Fair Wage

While some states have eliminated the subminimum wage, or raised it above the paltry federal rate, the vast majority of states still allow employers to pay servers less than minimum wage. Restaurant servers in the U.S. are about 70 percent female and disproportionately women of color. Young people, disabled workers and incarcerated people in many states also receive subminimum wages.

The system of subminimum wages and tipping is a legacy of slavery. After the Civil War, white business owners replaced wages with tipping because they did not want to pay their Black employees. Today, the subminimum wage harms women of color, in particular, who face biases from customers, which shows up in lower tips.

Front and Center: ‘Politicians Who Believe Guaranteed Income Programs Discourage People From Working Are Wrong’

Back for its third year, Front and Center is a groundbreaking Ms. series that offers first-person accounts of Black mothers living in Jackson, Miss., receiving a guaranteed income. First launched in 2018, the Magnolia Mother’s Trust (MMT) is about to enter its fifth cohort, bringing the number of moms served to more than 400 and making it the longest-running guaranteed income program in the country. Across the country, guaranteed income pilots like MMT are finding that recipients are overwhelmingly using their payments for basic needs like groceries, housing and transportation.

“I’ve always had a good relationship with my kids, but MMT has allowed me to say ‘yes’ more. … My son and I both have birthdays coming up and I told him we could plan something fun, maybe go out of town. I’ve never taken them out of town before.”