Lily, whose lawsuit against her employer paved the way for the Fair Pay Act of 2009, dedicated decades of her life to fighting for equal pay, according to the producers of a film about her life released this month.・It was announced that Mr. Ledbetter had passed away. She was 86 years old.
Ledbetter started work at Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company in Gadsden, Alabama, in 1979, but “needed the money to pay for college tuition and a mortgage,” he said. She spoke at the Forbes Women’s Summit.
Ledbetter said she initially earned the same income as a man. However, over time, her salary dropped “far beyond common sense” compared to that of her male colleagues, but she didn’t know it. The factory said employees who shared salary information could lose their jobs in 2021. It wasn’t until 1998 that Ms. Ledbetter received an anonymous note and learned that she was actually making far less than men in the same position.
“I was devastated,” she said.
In a 2018 opinion essay for the Times, Ms. Ledbetter wrote that she was also sexually harassed early in her tenure at Goodyear.
When Ledbetter learned of the pay disparity, she went home and discussed it with her husband. “And we decided to fight,” she said in a speech at the 2012 Democratic National Convention.
Ms. Ledbetter filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 1998 and filed a lawsuit against Goodyear in 1999. He won his case in federal court in Alabama in 2003, with a jury awarding him $3.8 million. (In a 2009 interview with NPR, Ms. Ledbetter said that amount was reduced to a cap of $300,000 and a back pay of $60,000.)
But she told NPR she hasn’t received a penny of that money.
The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, which ruled in Goodyear’s favor in a 5-4 decision in 2007, holding that Mr. Ledbetter’s case had been filed too late (more than 180 days) after the initial payment decision. said. she is inferior to men.
Ledbetter said Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s dissenting opinion led to the case being brought to Congress. In 2009, Congress approved legislation expanding workers’ rights to sue in such cases. The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act changed the deadline to reset the 180-day limit for filing a claim each time a discriminatory paycheck is paid, not just the first paycheck.
This was the first bill signed by former President Barack Obama.
“It is fitting that in the first bill I will sign, the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, we uphold one of this country’s first principles: that we are all created equal. “Everyone deserves the opportunity to pursue their own version of happiness,” Obama said.
Ms. Ledbetter visited the White House again in 2014 and stood with a group of women behind Mr. Obama as she signed two executive actions that made it easier for women to know if they had been deceived by their employers.
Ms. Ledbetter was born Lily McDaniel in Alabama to J.C. McDaniel, a mechanic, and Edna Smith McDaniel. She is survived by her daughter, Vicki Ledbetter Saxon; son, Philip Ledbetter; and several grandchildren. Ms. Ledbetter’s husband, Charles Ledbetter, died in 2008.
In his posthumous statement, Obama wrote: “Lily Ledbetter never set out to be a pioneer or a celebrity. She just wanted to be paid the same as men for her hard work.”
Although Ledbetter won’t receive any money as a result of the 2009 bill, she said she got personal satisfaction from it.
“Goodyear will never have to pay for defrauding me,” Ledbetter recalled saying after the signing ceremony. “The truth is, I’ll never see a penny. But with the president’s signature today, I get an even bigger reward.”
Full obituary follows.
