Jean Godden

Jean Godden used to be one of six columnists for the now-closed Seattle Post-Intelligencer newspaper. The other five were men. Then, Godden, who is now a Seattle City Council member, found out she was the lowest paid of the six.

“I don’t want another woman to face the same problem I faced with wage discrimination,” Godden said at a Thursday announcement of two proposed bills in Washington’s Legislature to tackle the disparity between what men and women are paid for similar work.

“Even today, women are paid 80 cents for every dollar earned by men for similar work,” said Rep. Tana Senn, D-Mercer Island. Senn and Sen. Annette Cleveland, D-Vancouver, plan to introduce companion bills to require employers to provide valid reasons — such as differences in education, training or experience — if employees challenge pay disparities between workers of the opposite sex for essentially the same work.

The proposed bills would allow gender-based pay disputes to be taken to an administrative judge at the Washington Department of Labor & Industries. The bills would also forbid employers from ordering workers not to disclose their salaries, and would forbid ordering employees from sharing pay information with each other. Nine states have similar laws.

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