Women's wages hot topic at Gillibrand forum

About 30 women -- lawyers, doctors and business owners among them -- gathered in an office of a defense contractor in Hauppauge Friday afternoon to talk about a war many of them have been fighting for decades: a battle for equal pay and representation at the higher levels of corporate America.

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D- N.Y), was on hand to lead what was called a Long Island Women's Economic Empowerment Roundtable. And to help empower the group Gillibrand offered a theme.

During World War II one symbol of America's strength was Rosie the Riveter, a fictional woman whose picture in workclothes adorned the walls of defense factories to inspire women replacing the men who had gone to battle.

"We need the Rosie the Riveter of our generation," Gillibrand said at the meeting at GSE Dynamics Inc., a manufacturer of parts for military airplanes and submarines.

"We do not have pay parity," she said. "We do not have political parity. We are still fighting the battle our mothers and grandmothers fought."

Attendees agreed, but how to get there was the question. And another question was why, even in the 21st century, such matters are still an issue.

Gillibrand said women earn only 78 cents compared to each dollar a man makes, that only 3 percent of the nation's chief executive officers are women, and that when women start businesses they begin with eight times less capital than men do.

There have been some gains.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics last week reported that in New York State wage increases for women last year lifted their pay to the highest percentage of men's since the federal government began keeping such statistics 14 years ago.

Women who worked full-time in 2010 earned a median $747 a week, or 86.8 percent of men's $861, the bureau said.

But Dr. Neeta M. Shah, vice president of Womens' Health Services at North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health Systems in Manhasset, said women physicians earn 40 percent less than their male colleagues. "We're still way behind," she said, adding that women need to advocate more for their rights.

Kim M. Smith, an attorney and president of the Suffolk Womens' Bar Association, said 50 percent of law school graduates are now women, "but we do not make up 50 percent of the judiciary."

Donna Haynes, a vice president of Women Economic Developers of Long Island, said it is difficult for women to re-enter the workforce after being caregivers to children for a decade or more. "These people are struggling," Haynes said.

Gillibrand, who has been holding similar sessions with women around the state, said there will be other meetings on Long Island in the future. "I think women's voices need to be heard more in business and politics," she said.