Sponsors (47)
The bill substantially strengthens pay-equity protections, transparency, training, and enforcement to help close wage gaps (especially for women and racial minorities), but does so at the cost of greater compliance, reporting, administrative, and litigation burdens for employers and additional spending and privacy risks for taxpayers and workers, with some protections delayed or limited for small employers.
Women and racial/ethnic minorities (and other employees and job applicants) will gain substantially stronger pay-equity protections, more public pay data, and enhanced enforcement tools (private damages, agency remedies, broader evidence standards) that together make it easier to detect, challenge, and reduce pay discrimination.
Employees will have clearer legal protections to discuss wages and blow the whistle about pay disparities, plus anti‑retaliation protection and private enforcement avenues (injunctive relief, fees, damages), improving workers' ability to assert rights.
Students, jobseekers, and workers (particularly women) will gain negotiation and career-readiness training integrated into K–12, higher education, and workforce programs, helping individuals better negotiate wages and benefits over their careers.
Employers — especially small and mid-sized firms — will face increased compliance, data-collection, documentation and litigation costs (including potential large damage awards and class actions), which could raise hiring costs or be passed to consumers.
Taxpayers and federal agencies will likely incur new or higher spending to support grants, training, data systems, research, outreach, award administration, and enforcement (authorized funding is open-ended), increasing budgetary pressure or diverting resources from other programs.
Broader reporting and disaggregated pay-data collection raise confidentiality and privacy risks (especially in small labor markets) and could create competitive concerns for employers.
Based on analysis of 14 sections of legislative text.
Bans employers from using applicants' wage history, strengthens pay-equality enforcement and remedies, requires employer pay-data reporting, and funds negotiation-training grants.
Introduced March 25, 2025 by Patty Murray · Last progress March 25, 2025
Prohibits covered employers from asking about or using a job applicant’s wage history when making hiring or pay decisions, creates civil penalties and a private right of action for violations, and strengthens federal enforcement tools to close gender and race pay gaps. It also requires large employers and federal contractors to report detailed compensation data by sex, race, and ethnicity, funds negotiation-training grants and outreach, expands remedies for pay-discrimination claims, and directs federal agencies to study, publish, and provide technical assistance on pay equity. The measure sets a six-month delayed effective date for most changes, exempts small enterprises consistent with the FLSA, authorizes unspecified appropriations to implement programs, and increases agency responsibilities (EEOC, DOL, OFCCP, BLS) for data collection, enforcement, training, and reporting while creating an annual federal pay-equity award for employers who demonstrate substantial progress.