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Jamie Bolar, second year counseling, adult and higher education graduate student, gives journalism major David Fixmer baked goods Tuesday in the DuSable Hall lobby. Bolar and senior sociology major Alexandria Springer were selling baked goods as part of the Women's Resource Center's Equal Pay Day where men were charged $1 and women only $0.75 to illustrate inequalities in women's salaries.
Women's Resource Center bake sale raises awareness of Equal Pay Day
Last updated on 04/28/2009 at 10:42 p.m.
Most bake sales charge a dollar equally for everyone, but the bake sale the Women’s Resource Center held Tuesday took a different approach.
It’s commonly referenced that a woman makes 75 cents for every dollar a man makes, which is why at this bake sale, women paid only 75 cents for treats while men had to pay a dollar.
“The pricing may seem odd,” said Jamie Bolar, a graduate assistant for the resource center. “But I want to show the pay discrepancy for every dollar a man makes.”
The bake sale was held on Equal Pay Day. Established in 1999, Equal Pay Day is celebrated annually nationwide to raise awareness about unfair pay for women in America and is acknowledged on the fourth Tuesday in April.
Bolar started the sale after learning more about the topic.
“I started researching the National Committee on Pay Equity around November after reading through some statistics,” Bolar said.
Junior business major Kenneth Mitchell expressed his support for the program, not wasting any time munching through his just-purchased cookies.
“It’s a shame that women earn less money than men in these times,” Mitchell said. “This program shows how even in modern days women are still treated with sexist attitudes when at times they work twice as hard as men do.”
Shawn Wesson, a sophomore from College of DuPage, also donated to the bake sale as he passed out tiny pamphlets advertising summer work.
“I am all for equal rights and I believe that it’s degrading that women don’t share the same privileges as men do, when they are actually the ones that birth us,” Wesson said.
The proceeds of the event will go toward general upkeep and purchasing new books for Founders Memorial Library.
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I am a woman, and although I support women's rights and equal pay, this bake sale only perpetuates women's inequalities. Notice how two out of the three quotes in the article are from men and express pity for women's inequalities. Pity is a form of oppression, too.
