Floor Statements

Madam President, we are now on the eve of the so-called sequester. Tomorrow, March 1, Federal agencies will begin making $85 billion in arbitrary, destructive budget cuts--cuts that economists tell us will damage our fragile economy and cost nearly 1 million jobs. This is a shame and it is shameful. This is yet another self-inflicted wound to our economy, and it is completely unnecessary.

For months, President Obama and Democrats in Congress have urged Republicans to join with us in negotiating a balanced package of spending cuts and revenue increases to head off this sequester. Regrettably, we have run up against the same old response from our Republican colleagues: obstruction, obstruction, obstruction--an adamant refusal to compromise. They reject the very idea of a balanced approach, insisting that all deficit reduction must come exclusively from cuts to spending and investment. Since they have not gotten their way, they are now willing to allow all the destructive impacts of the sequester to happen.

Think about it, because it really is breathtaking. Republicans would rather allow our economy to lose up to a million jobs than to close a tax loophole that pays companies to move American jobs to foreign countries. They would rather risk jolting the economy back into recession than to close a tax loophole that allows hedge fund managers making hundreds of millions of dollars a year to pay a lower tax rate than middle-class families. It really is breathtaking.

I am deeply concerned about the arbitrary cuts to programs that undergird the middle class in this country--everything from medical research to

education to food and drug safety. Earlier this week, the Director of the National Institutes of Health, Dr. Francis Collins, warned that the sequester would slash $1.6 billion from NIH's budget, directly damaging ongoing research into cancer, Alzheimer's, and other diseases.

Funding for special education would also suffer deep cuts, eliminating Federal support for more than 7,200 teachers, aides, and other staff who support our students with disabilities.

Funding for food safety would be severely impacted, resulting in thousands of fewer inspections, a slowdown in meat processing, costing jobs and endangering the safety of the public. The Food Safety and Inspection Service may have to furlough all employees for approximately 2 weeks, which could close down or severely restrict meatpacking plants around the country.

The list of destructive budget cuts goes on and on, and what many people may not understand is that these are just the latest cuts to spending and investment.

Over the past 2 years, the President and Congress have already agreed to $1.4 trillion in spending cuts, all from the discretionary side of the budget. These have been very dramatic spending reductions.

As I said earlier today, when we hear the Speaker of the House say: Well, since the first of the year, we have given on revenues but we have not had any spending cuts--he says: No more revenues, just spending cuts because we have already done the revenues--well, you see what he is doing is he is drawing an arbitrary starting line. His starting line is the first of this year. But you have to go back a year and a half to the Budget Control Act when, beginning with that, this Congress made $1.4 trillion in spending cuts--$1.4 trillion--and in January we did $700 billion in revenues. So we are still $2 in cuts for every $1 in revenue. Yet the Speaker says we should have no more revenues, all spending cuts, to get up to our $4 trillion that is needed to stabilize our debt in this country. So that means he wants to have another $2.6--well, let me think about that; I have to add it up-- it would be $1.9 trillion more in spending cuts.

Think about that, and think about it in terms of just one area that I know about firsthand in my capacity as chair of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies. That subcommittee has jurisdiction over spending, for example, at the National Institutes of Health. Over the last 2 years, Congress has completely eliminated 65 programs under that jurisdiction, totaling $1.3 billion. What that means is no more funding for education technology, $100 million; no more funding for civic education, $35 million; no more funding for creating smaller learning communities in high schools, another $88 million.

LIHEAP, the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, has been cut by $1.6 billion. That is a 30-percent cut--a 30-percent cut. That cut eliminates home heating and cooling assistance for 1.5 million low- income and elderly households in this country. That has already been done. Now the Speaker wants to do more. Maybe he wants to eliminate the entire LIHEAP program.

The administration's signature education initiative, Race to the Top, has been cut by $150 million. That is a 20-percent cut--already, a 20- percent cut. That is what we have done already. If we cut any more, you are really going to be destroying education initiatives in this country.

How about lead poisoning, childhood lead poisoning. It has been cut by 93 percent, from $29 million a year down to $2 million, meaning that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention no more has any funding to test children for lead poisoning. And we know that if you get kids early, you can stop the deteriorating effects of lead poisoning. But now we are not even going to be testing these kids anymore.

National programs to keep our schools safe and drug free have been cut by two-thirds, from $191 million to $65 million.

As I said, national programs that keep schools safe and drug free are cut by two-thirds. I wonder how many people know that. I wonder how many people know we cut that already by two-thirds.

Again, this list goes on and on with deep cuts to vital programs. I wish to emphasize, these are the cuts we have already made in the last 2 years. The sequester will cut them even further.

Fighting childhood lead poisoning, which we know continues on in this country, we know how it destroys kids and their future growth, and we know early intervention can alleviate that. Yet it has been cut by 93 percent. What are we going to do, cut it by another 7 percent? We just will not have any efforts at all to test kids for lead poisoning early on. The sequester will have very real consequences for the economy and for our society.

Finally, let me step back and put our discussion of this sequester in a broader perspective. By all means, we need to reduce deficits further, especially in the longer term. But I have questioned repeatedly the sort of obsessive, exclusive, almost borderline hysterical focus on budget deficits. Meanwhile, we are neglecting other urgent national priorities. How about the jobs deficit, the deficit in our investment in our infrastructure, the deficit in our investment in a strong, growing, middle class?

What we need is an approach to the budget that addresses all of these--reducing budget deficits, yes, but doing it in a way that allows us to strengthen the middle class and lay the foundation for future economic growth.

We also need to look at the demographic projectory of our country as well as the challenges posed by globalization. Our Nation is growing older with the retiring baby boomers. This will dramatically increase government costs for health care and other services. We are also now in a global economy competing not only in manufacturing but also in a growing range of services, from telemarketing to the reading of medical MRIs. In order to compete successfully and keep quality jobs in the United States, we need to invest robustly both in a 21st century infrastructure, as well as in a system of education and training that equips our young people and workers for the jobs of the future.

In this broader context, what is the best way to address the resulting deficits? Do we just slash spending for education, slash spending for infrastructure, slash spending for research and discovery, sacrificing the investments we will need to grow our economy in the decades ahead? Do we just allow this destructive sequester to kick in, costing us jobs, cutting vital supports for middle-class Americans?

These are the destructive budget options which will take effect starting tomorrow if we fail to act. This is why I come to the floor, at the eleventh hour, to plead one final time for a compromise and common sense from Republicans. Yes, I am here to plead for some common sense, some compromise from Republican leadership.

There are plenty of areas where we can cut spending without seriously harming the economy. There are plenty of commonsense options for raising revenue without lifting tax rates or hurting the middle class.

It is still possible for Senators to come together, but that may only happen if we have some willingness to compromise on the Republican side.

When the Speaker says absolutely no more revenue, how do you compromise with that? We know from the polling data that the vast majority of the American people, 60, 70 percent, believe we should have a balanced approach, both in revenues and in cutting spending.

We have reached out our hand in an effort to shake hands with the Republicans. They have not reciprocated by reaching out their hand to close the deal.

It is still possible, but it is only possible if the other side is willing to make some compromises. Time is short. I urge colleagues to put ideology and this partisanship aside, stop this sequester, tackle these budget deficits in a way that allows us to invest in a growing economy and a stronger middle class.

A lot of people say if the sequester kicks in, people aren't going to feel it right away. Well, maybe not tomorrow night, maybe not even Saturday or Sunday. We will beginning next week, when the Food Safety and Inspection Service starts furloughing people and we begin fewer inspections and maybe the week after that when our air traffic

controllers begin to be furloughed because they don't have enough money and air traffic begins to slow down in New York and Chicago and Washington, DC, and Atlanta.

It is always true that in times such as these, when we have these kinds of crises facing us, who gets hurt first and the most are the people at the bottom rung of the ladder, kids with disabilities, families who need some heating assistance in the middle of the winter, elderly people who may need some Meals On Wheels delivered to their homes.

These are always the people who get hit first and the hardest. We can't forget our societal obligations as a Congress to make sure their needs are met also. We can't turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the needs of people in our society who don't have anything anyway. We can't throw them out in the cold. We can't let our children be denied Head Start programs or adequate child care programs. This is not befitting a great and wonderful society such as America.

I am hopeful with a meeting in the White House tomorrow--as I know it is not just a photo opportunity--we will hear from the Speaker of the House that, yes, we need a balanced approach, and we are willing to take that balanced approach. If they do that, we can get this settled within the next few days and then move ahead.

So that is my hope for tomorrow. And I hope, again, we will see some forthcoming on the part of Republicans that they are indeed willing to compromise.

Madam President, I yield the floor.

This has been very interesting. This is not what I was going to speak on. I was going to speak on the amount of cuts we have already taken in our appropriations bill on Labor, Health, Human Services, Education, NIH, and Centers for Disease Control.

I could not help but hear my friend from Pennsylvania talk about the President's budget as though that is controlling this. Would the Republicans want to adopt everything in the President's budget? I don't think so. They might want to select this or that or this or that, but are we now hearing from my friends on the other side that we should just carte blanche rubberstamp the President's budget? I sure hope not.

I remind my friends that the Constitution of the United States clearly says this body has two functions: taxing and spending--not the President and not the executive branch. The executive branch can propose whatever budget they want, it is up to us to decide both how to collect the taxpayers' money and how to spend it. It does not matter to me exactly what the President proposes. What I want to know is how do we--as Senators and as Congressmen--feel about where we should be investing our money and on what we ought to be spending the taxpayers' money.

The idea that somehow the President's budget says this or that and that people can pick and choose whatever they want with it, I submit again, I will bet my friends on the other side will not say: We will just adopt the President's budget as it is and we will go with that. I don't think they are ready to do that. I would not even do that for a President of my own party.

I wish to talk a second, again, about sort of the intransigence on the part of my friends on the Republican side--not only in this body but in the other body--of not countenancing any other funding or raising of revenues. I keep hearing the Speaker say: We gave revenues last month, that we had $700 billion of revenues last month; now it is time to talk about spending cuts.

What the Speaker has done is he has drawn an arbitrary starting line of January 2013. What about last year and the year before when we adopted over $1.4 trillion in spending cuts that have already been adopted? What about the starting line there? That is when we started to address the $4 trillion we needed by 2020 to stabilize our debt.

We have come up with about $1.4 trillion in spending cuts and about $700 billion in revenue. It is not the idea that we have already given up and that we have collected enough revenue. That is not it at all. Going forward we need a balance between revenues and spending cuts.

I want to read some of the things we have done in our own committee last year. We had $1.3 billion in cuts. We eliminated the education technology state grants, which a lot of people kind of liked. The Even Start Program was eliminated. The tech-prep education state grants were eliminated. The mentoring children of prisoners was eliminated; the foreign language assistance was eliminated; the civic education was eliminated; The Alcohol Abuse Reduction Program was eliminated. The career pathways innovation fund was eliminated.

Many of these programs were started by my friends on the Republican side at some time in the past, some were started by Democrats, but most of them were started jointly with Republican and Democrats. What I am pointing out is that we have already cut a lot of things out of Health and Human Services, education, NIH, and the Centers for Disease Control. I can tell that you Dr. Francis Collins, the head of NIH, warned that the sequester will slash another $1.6 billion from NIH's budget at the very time when we are on the cusp of having some good breakthroughs in medical research. A lot of medical researchers have been lined up and doing some great programs out there. Now all of a sudden they are going to have the rug pulled out from underneath them, but that is what is going to happen.

I might mention the kids with disabilities and what is going to happen with the funding for the IDEA, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. I am told about 7,200 teachers, aides, and other staff who help our communities and our schools cope with kids with disabilities who come into schools--because under IDEA we are providing that kind of support--are going to be cut. But it is going to be cut.

So this idea that somehow we can keep cutting and cutting and cutting and we are going to get to some magic land where we can continue to function as a society just isn't so. We need revenues. That is what is in the bill the majority leader has proposed, revenues that will help us reach that point where we can have both spending cuts and revenues and stabilize our debt at a reasonable percentage of our GDP.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I wish to announce that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions will meet in open session on Tuesday, February 26, 2013, at 2:30 p.m. in room 216 of the Hart Senate Office Building to conduct a hearing entitled ``State Leadership and Innovation in Disability Employment.''

For further information regarding this meeting, please contact Alyssa Mowitz of the committee staff on (202) 228-3453.

Mr. President, I wish to announce that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions will meet in open session on Wednesday, February 27, 2013, at 10:00 a.m. in room 430 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building to conduct a hearing entitled ``Animal Drug User Fee Agreements: Advancing Animal Health for the Public Health.''

For further information regarding this meeting, please contact Kathleen Laird of the committee staff on (202) 224-6840.

Committee on Energy and Natural Resources

Mr. President, in accordance with rule XXVI.2 of the Standing Rules of the Senate, I submit for publication in the Congressional Record the Rules of Procedure for the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, as unanimously adopted by the Committee on February 13, 2013.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of the Rules of Procedure be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, on January 31, one of the most unique and interesting individuals I have ever known passed away while receiving hospice care at the Southern Arizona VA Health Care System. He was my brother-in-law, Joe McQuaid, a 92-year-old veteran of the Second World War.

I will have more to say about this unique individual at a later date. But, today, I want to express my deep gratitude to all of the wonderful professionals at the Southern Arizona VA Health Care System for the extraordinary care they gave to him in the last 2 months of his life.

Joe McQuaid was a strapping 6 feet 4 inches. He was healthy all of his life until last November 15. On that day, after his daily exercise, he fell in a freak accident and broke his hip. He was operated on at the Tucson VA hospital, and his hip seemed to be healing just fine. But after being transferred to a local rehabilitation facility, Joe fell again and re-broke his hip. He was readmitted to the VA hospital, but his condition deteriorated rapidly and he passed away on January 31.

The personnel at the VA medical center in Tucson could not have been more professional, skilled, and compassionate in the care they gave to Joe McQuaid in those final two months. They did everything possible to treat his injury and help him to recover. But once it became clear that recovery was not possible, they took wonderful care of him, admitting him to hospice care, attending to his needs, and ensuring that he had a gentle passing.

As a veteran myself, during all my years in Congress I have always been very supportive of our VA system and

our veterans. I have long believed that our nation has a sacred obligation to those who have borne the burdens of battle and national defense, and we must ensure that they have access to first-rate health care.

So it was with great pride that I had this opportunity to witness firsthand the extraordinary care and attention that staff members at the Tucson VA center were giving to this 92-year-old veteran.

At the risk of leaving out the names of others who cared for my brother-in-law, I specifically want to thank and salute Jonathan Gardner, the director of the Southern Arizona VA Health Care System, for his leadership of that institution and for his many years of distinguished service to the VA system. Also Julianne French, a registered nurse and administrative assistant to the chief medical officer, who was so responsive to my inquiries and calls. Also Dr. David Emelity, the acting chief of staff, Dr. Richard Hoffman, and Dr. Joao Ferreira, all of who took a deep personal interest in Joe's medical condition.

And a special thank you to Glenda Riggs, clinical nurse leader in the intensive care unit, who cared for Joe and went out of her way to keep me and members of Joe's family informed at every step of his treatment and care. I can't speak too highly of Nurse Riggs' skill and compassion, and her tireless attention to all of her patients and their families.

The Southern Arizona VA Health Care System has a wonderful team, with great leadership from Jonathan Gardner. It is clear to me that any veteran who comes through the doors of that center is going to get superb treatment.

I am proud of all the people who work in America's VA system, and I am grateful for the care they give to our veterans. My recent experience, seeing firsthand the quality of care and the quality of staff at the center in Tucson, reaffirms my faith in the VA system and my respect for the great work they do.

Again, I just want to thank the entire team at the Southern Arizona VA Health Care System. Thank you for all you did for this 92-year-old World War II veteran, Joe McQuaid. And thank you for the same high- quality care you give to all of the veterans at the Tucson center.

Mr. President, I wish to announce that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions will meet in executive session on Wednesday, February 13, 2013, at 10:00 a.m. in room 430 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building to mark up the Committee Funding Resolution for the 113th Congress; the Adoption of Committee Rules for the 113th Congress; the Adoption of Committee Rules for the 113th Congress; H.R. 307, the Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Reauthorization Act of 2013; and the Prematurity Research Expansion and Education for Mothers who deliver Infants Early (PREEMIE) Act.

For further information regarding this meeting, please contact the Committee on (202) 224-5375.

Mr. President, this week is a milestone for working families across America. Twenty years ago this week, President Bill Clinton signed into law the Family and Medical Leave Act. There are many laws we pass in Washington that most Americans never have reason to know or care about. The FMLA, by contrast, has changed this country in profoundly important ways.

It has touched the lives of millions of working families. It is almost hard to imagine today, but 20 years ago before this landmark law, workers had to risk their jobs and livelihoods when family needs arose. There was no national policy for maternity leave or paternity leave. New mothers were sometimes compelled to return to work just days after giving birth or to quit jobs they would otherwise have liked to keep.

There was no law allowing someone to take leave from work to care for an aging, potentially dying parent or to care for a child with a serious illness. Families had to leave their loved ones in the hands of others or quit their jobs and face dire economic consequences. There was no policy to allow a seriously ill worker to return to work after recovering from cancer or other serious health condition. All these workers risked being fired, having no job to return to, and losing their health insurance as well.

Countless hard-working Americans were forced to make wrenching choices between their or their family's health and their economic well- being.

The passage of the Family and Medical Leave Act changed all that. It has helped new parents bond with their children during those first magical few weeks of life. It has helped to give workers struggling with a difficult diagnosis the time and security they need to recover. It has allowed loving family members to care for relatives with disabilities and elderly parents.

It has ensured that family members of our wounded warriors can be there to help their heroes recover. Just as important, it has helped countless businesses across the country retain good workers and maintain an experienced and dedicated workforce.

The FMLA has been an unqualified success. It has made a real difference in the lives of millions of hard-working Americans. In fact, the FMLA has been

used more than 100 million times since its passage 20 years ago.

To be sure, the legislative path to the Family and Medical Leave Act was not easy nor quick. In the Senate, Senator Chris Dodd was the tireless champion of the Family and Medical Leave Act. From the time of its first introduction in 1986 to its final passage in 1993, we would not have the Family and Medical Leave Act without Senator Chris Dodd. He held multiple subcommittee hearings across the country, hearing from dozens of witnesses. He led the bill through multiple committee markups and led the floor fight year after year after year. He worked to override two Presidential vetoes and shepherded it to its final passage in 1993, after which it became the first law signed by a new President, President Bill Clinton.

Senator Dodd found a partner in Senator Kit Bond from Missouri, whose strong interest in shoring up the American family led him to work with Senator Dodd on a bipartisan compromise proposal that would garner significant political support in both political parties. As Senator Bond said upon introducing the final version of the bill in 1993:

I believe the single most important step we can take to

help all families in America is to try to reinstill

individual and family responsibility. To do that, we as a

society need to make family obligation something we encourage

rather than discourage. That is why I believe we should enact

the Family and Medical Leave Act.

Their bipartisan efforts have reaped huge rewards.

My office has heard from people around the country who have benefited from the Family and Medical Leave Act.

The Family and Medical Leave Act meant that Kimberly Jones of Wisconsin was able to help her developmentally challenged son, David, during a critical time. After years of struggling socially and in school, after a misdiagnosis that led to medications that made him worse, David finally received the correct diagnosis of Asperger's syndrome, which allowed him to get the right care and the appropriate treatment. The FMLA allowed Kim to take 12 weeks off from work so she could be with her son, David, to advocate for him, seek out professionals, learn how to help him, and support him through detoxification from his previous medications.

Thanks to the FMLA, Kim was able to get David situated and take the time to do what was best for him. Kim says parents shouldn't have to lose their jobs to do what is best for their children. She adds that children and families are in a better place because of the Family and Medical Leave Act.

Tonya Pinkston from Atlanta, GA, was diagnosed with lupus in 2009, but she was allowed only 3 sick days a year. As the sole earner in her household with her parents and daughter, she absolutely had to keep her job. Her boss suggested the Family and Medical Leave Act. Later, when her lupus flared, she was able to take leave for 4 weeks to allow her 1 week in the hospital and recuperation at home.

Without the Family and Medical Leave Act, Tonya would have been fired for missing so much time and she probably would have had to go on unemployment insurance. Tonya thanks God for the FMLA and feels fortunate that President Bill Clinton signed it and it was there when she needed it.

Right now at a Baltimore hospital, Michelle Marrocco is using FMLA leave to care for her son, Brendan, a wounded warrior injured while serving in the Army in Iraq in 2009. Brendan is the first surviving quadruple amputee and has already faced challenges few of us can imagine. In December, he underwent a double-arm transplant. It has been widely reported in the news media. Brendan will need years of rehabilitation and occupational therapy.

When Brendan was originally injured, Michelle's employer at the time voluntarily paid for 3 months of leave. Michelle's current employer adheres to the FMLA, allowing her up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for Brendan following his transplants.

She expects to take 2 months of leave, followed by intermittent leave to be with her son once a week. Without the FMLA, Michelle would have had to quit her job. With the FMLA, she knows she doesn't have to worry about her job, which is a huge relief for her. The lack of income is a big concern, but it is something she and her husband will worry about later. Thanks to new regulations from the Department of Labor, Michelle will be able to take advantage of a new provision of the Family and Medical Leave Act, allowing up to 26 weeks of leave for the families of veterans injured in the line of duty.

The Family and Medical Leave Act is one of our Nation's most important laws. That is why I will introduce this week a resolution honoring the FMLA and the leaders who made the FMLA a reality.

There are so many. I mentioned those who were here in the Senate; there were those in the House who also helped shepherd this through. I would mention, of course, Connie Morella, a former Congresswoman who was so active in the bill.

I would mention also George Miller, Congressman George Miller, and Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro, who worked so hard to get this passed in the House. There were people on the outside, Judy Lichtman, in 1993, was the head of something called the Women's Legal Defense Fund. She and her colleague Donna Lenhoff played absolutely critical roles in getting the FMLA written, introduced, and across the finish line. I wanted to mention those heroes who worked so hard for this important bill.

There is still more work to do to ensure that families are fully able to meet their family responsibilities as well as maintain economic security.

Today, workers are ineligible to take FMLA for a variety of reasons. Some workers do not have enough tenure with their current employer, even if they have been in the workforce for years.

The FMLA requires 1 year of service, but in today's economy, workers more frequently change jobs and, of course, family emergencies happen without warning. Other workers are not able to accumulate the required 1,250 hours of work with a single employer in the preceding year. With the growth in part-time work, both by choice and by necessity, more workers may be ineligible for FMLA even though they are long-term dedicated employees. Millions of people work in businesses with fewer than 50 employees, which means their employer is not covered by the FMLA and does not have to offer that kind of leave.

This also makes it harder for smaller businesses to recruit the best employees because they are not on a level playing field with larger companies that must provide leave and where workers have come to expect it.

Still other workers are excluded from the law because of the nature of their relationship with a loved one. Workers may only take FMLA to care for their minor child, parents or spouses. Under certain circumstances, parents may care for their adult child with a disability. This excludes siblings, grandchildren and grandparents, domestic partners of the same or opposite sex, in-laws, cousins, and everyone else.

That is why the Family and Medical Leave Inclusion Act sponsored by Senator Durbin is so important. This bill will expand and modernize the definition of family to include many currently excluded relationships. Too many workers will otherwise have no one eligible to care for them in a time of need or the person they rely on most will not be recognized as their family for purposes of the FMLA. This is a commonsense change we can and must accomplish.

One of the most common and critical challenges faced by families is the loss of income while taking unpaid FMLA leave. This obliges parents to cut short maternity and paternity leave. It forces cancer patients to work as much as possible, rather than taking time to fully recuperate or, worse, to forgo leave altogether. Still others are financially devastated when they have no choice but to take unpaid leave.

We cannot allow family responsibilities to jeopardize families' economic security. A social insurance program to provide some wage replacement during family and medical leave would allow families to maintain their economic security while seeing to their families. Research shows this could be done on a universal basis with very small, shared contributions by workers and their employers. Two States, New Jersey and California, have already implemented such paid leave systems, helping families in those States to be financially secure during family and medical leave.

Today is the day to honor the efforts of so many whose work led to the passage and signing of the Family and Medical Leave Act 20 years ago. This is a time to reflect on how transformative the Family and Medical Leave Act has been for our society. It is also time to look ahead to additional ways we can support families and allow them to stay strong, mutually supportive, and economically secure.

I look forward to future work to expand and strengthen the protections of the Family and Medical Leave Act.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I wish to announce that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions will meet in open session on Thursday, February 7, 2013, at 10:00 a.m. in room 216 of the Hart Senate Office Building to conduct a hearing entitled ``No Child Left Behind: Early Lessons from State Flexibility Waivers.''

For further information regarding this meeting, please contact Leanne Hotek of the committee staff on (202) 228-6685.

Madam President, on February 9, theater lovers and performers will come together at the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City, CA, to honor Ed Waterstreet, the retiring founding artistic director of Deaf West Theater.

Mr. Waterstreet founded the Deaf West Theater in 1991 with the goal of establishing the first permanent, resident American Sign Language theater company on the west coast. Ed began--as he puts it--``with only one chair, one desk and a typewriter in an office space shared with and donated by the Fountain Theater in Hollywood.'' From those humble beginnings, he inspired and led the creation of a theater company that has produced 40 plays and 4 musicals, and has won more than 80 theater awards. Deaf West Theater's production of ``Big River: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn'' opened in North Hollywood and ended up in New York City, earning two Tony nominations and a Tony honor for excellence in theater. Equally important, he succeeding in creating a theater whose productions are fully accessible to individuals who are deaf and hard of hearing, as well as others.

I have had the pleasure of attending both ``Big River'' and other Deaf West performances and, let me tell you, it is a thrilling and unique experience. Productions are presented in American Sign Language, with simultaneous sign-to-voice translation for hearing members of the audience. As Ed explains: ``Our deaf audiences can have the pleasure of watching the story unfold in our native American Sign Language. And on the other side of the coin, our hearing audiences have the customary theater experience, enhanced by the visual expressiveness of American Sign Language.''

Ed Waterstreet has had a long and distinguished career in theater. Before founding Deaf West Theater, he was a long-time member of the National Theater for the Deaf. His Hollywood acting credits include the Emmy-winning 1985 drama ``Love Is Never Silent.'' Throughout his more than two decades at the helm of Deaf West Theater, he has been dedicated to expanding opportunities for deaf artists. And he has pioneered innovative approaches to integrating nonhearing and hearing performers in stage productions.

Ed is now retired from Deaf West Theater, but he is by no means retiring. He says, ``The theater is still my baby.'' He plans to remain actively involved, as Deaf West continues to strive toward its goal of providing an exhilarating theatrical experience for all audiences, regardless of hearing or signing ability.

Regrettably, it will not be possible for me to join with Ed's many other admirers as they come together to honor him next month in California. But I, too, want to express my great respect for Ed Waterstreet's excellence as a performer and artistic leader, and for his passionate commitment to creating new opportunities for aspiring deaf performers not only on stage but also in film and television. I wish Ed and his wife, Linda Bove, all the very best in the years ahead.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Madam President, on what is her final day as Secretary of State, I would like to express my admiration and gratitude to Hillary Rodham Clinton for the extraordinary job she has done over the last 4 years. I agree wholeheartedly with President Obama who said she has been one of the finest Secretaries of State in our Nation's history.

When she took on this responsibility in January 2009, Hillary Clinton was already one of the most celebrated and accomplished women in the world. Certainly her reputation and renown have been tremendous assets as she worked to restore America's standing in the world.

Over the last 4 years, Hillary Clinton has been the ultimate workhorse public servant as opposed to the showhorse. This comes as no surprise to me and other former colleagues in the Senate. We know she is a leader of extraordinary substance and a talent with an amazing work ethic.

Secretary of State Clinton has set records as the most traveled Secretary for time in office, visiting some 42 countries just in the last year alone. She will be remembered for her tireless efforts to promote the empowerment of women worldwide and for her many demonstrations that ``smart power'' and assertive diplomacy can be far more effective than so-called ``hard power'' and military interventions.

I am especially grateful to Secretary of State Clinton for insisting on robust assistance to Haiti in the wake of the devastating earthquake of 2010. In addition, following my visit to Vietnam in 2010, and just prior to her own visit, we talked and I had urged her to pledge America's commitment to helping Vietnam clean up the sites contaminated by Agent Orange. She agreed wholeheartedly, and this is one way she has been very successful in repairing the breach with our former adversary and doing what is right and just for the victims of Agent Orange in Vietnam.

I have many fond memories of Hillary Clinton's 8 years here in the Senate. During that entire tenure, we served together on the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. In that role, as in her previous role as First Lady, she was an outspoken advocate for health care reform, fighting tirelessly to secure quality affordable health care for all Americans. Although she was no longer in the Senate when the Affordable Care Act passed and was signed into law, she shares enormous credit for laying the groundwork of that historic achievement.

Hillary Clinton has been a wonderful friend to my wife Ruth and to me, and, of course, from her many campaigns in my State, she has so many friends all across the State of Iowa. So she is retiring from the Department of State, but we all know that by no means is she a retiring person. There are many vivid chapters yet to be written in the story of Hillary Rodham Clinton. I wish her a richly deserved rest and much success and happiness in the years ahead.

Madam President, as we say goodbye to Secretary Clinton in her capacity as Secretary of State, we say welcome aboard and congratulations to my good friend Senator John Kerry on the resounding confirmation of his nomination to serve as our next Secretary of State. His departure will be a tremendous loss to the Senate, but I respect President Obama's decision to tap him for this absolutely critical position. There is no one in the United States better qualified by experience, knowledge, and temperament to step into this extraordinarily demanding job.

To repeat what my colleagues already know, but it always bears repeating, after volunteering to serve in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam war, John Kerry was awarded the Silver Star, a Bronze Star, and three Purple Hearts. Upon returning home, he became a national leader in the fight for justice for veterans who served beside him in Vietnam as well as for veterans of wars before and since Vietnam. He joined with others to found the Vietnam Veterans of America organization. He has worked hard here in the Senate over all of these years to secure veterans' benefits, for an extension of the GI bill for higher education, and for appropriate treatment for veterans with post- traumatic stress disorder.

As we all know, Senator Kerry has played a leading role in shaping American foreign policy for many years in his position on the Foreign Relations Committee and as chair of that distinguished committee. As chair of that committee, he was instrumental in securing passage of the New START treaty, a vital arms accord with Russia that is helping to reduce the danger of nuclear proliferation. He has served as a trusted special envoy to Afghanistan, Sudan, and Pakistan at crucial moments. Senator Kerry advocated for democratic elections in the Philippines. He was part of a delegation that uncovered the fraud that ultimately led to the removal of President Ferdinand Marcos. He was a strong proponent of U.S. action to end ethnic cleansing in Kosovo and to oppose sanctions on Burma tied to human rights abuses. Senator Kerry has been a leader in promoting economic development and recovery in Haiti, fighting global HIV/AIDS, supporting democracy and human dignity, poverty assistance, and the advancement of women's empowerment throughout the world.

In his early days in the Senate, Senator Kerry and I--in fact, we were elected together in 1984; we came to the Senate together. But shortly after that, Senator Kerry and I went on a factfinding mission to Nicaragua and unearthed information regarding the activities of the Contra guerillas, which he presented to the Committee on Foreign Relations. Based in part on his groundbreaking findings, the committee launched an investigation into the funding of the Contra guerillas that ultimately uncovered the Reagan administration's Iran-Contra scandal, a scheme to divert profits from illegal arms sales to Iran to support the Contra guerillas.

Senator Kerry and I, as I said, were both Members of the class of 1984 here in the Senate. We worked together to end illegal support of the Contras in Nicaragua, and we have collaborated on a range of human rights issues since then.

In particular, I salute his tireless and valiant attempt last year to pass the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. I can't tell my colleagues how hard he worked to get it through the committee and before that worked with others to make sure we had a good convention to the U.N. that mirrored our own Americans With Disabilities Act. John Kerry worked tirelessly on this, and I am deeply grateful for all that work and the passionate commitment he made to this treaty. I know he shares my disappointment that the Senate failed to give its consent to this treaty, but I look forward to working with him in his new role as Secretary of State and with Senator Menendez, our new chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, not only to promote the convention around the world, which I know Senator Kerry will do in his position as Secretary of State, but to once again bring this convention to the floor of the Senate and this time to prevail and pass it.

There is no question in my mind that John Kerry will be a great Secretary of State. I wish him and Teresa the very best, and I look forward to working with him in the years ahead.

Madam President, I yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, on January 29, 2009, President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay

Act. It was a proud day and I was there for that. A critical law, the first legislation signed into law by President Obama after his first election, reversed the outrageous Supreme Court decision in Ledbetter v Goodyear and made clear that a worker such as Lilly Ledbetter, who does not learn of her pay inequities for years, still had recourse to challenge her wage discrimination.

Today we celebrate the anniversary of the enactment of this important law, but at the same time we must recognize it was only a first step. We need to do much more to ensure that all workers in our society are paid fairly for their work and are not shortchanged because of the their gender, race or other personal characteristic. That is why, 4 years after enactment of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, I am proud to introduce once again the Fair Pay Act, a bill I have introduced in every Congress since 1996.

Let me give some background. In 1963, Congress enacted the Equal Pay Act to end unfair discrimination against women in the workplace. At that time, 25 million female workers earned just 60 percent of the average pay for men. While we have made progress toward the goal of true pay equity fully a half century later, too many women still do not get paid what men do for the same or nearly the same work. Let's be clear about this. The Equal Pay Act of 1963 has to do with women doing the same jobs as men. But still, on average, as we know, for every $1 a full-time male worker earns, a woman earns just 77 cents. So we have gone from 60 cents, in all those 60 years, to 77 cents for every $1 a man makes.

What does that translate into? You might say, OK, 7 cents is that a big deal? Yes, it is. Over a lifetime of work it means an average of $400,000 that a woman loses because of the unequal pay practices.

I will say that again later on, but that $400,000 is not just the pay she loses during her lifetime. Think about the retirement benefits that woman loses because she has been underpaid all those years. That is why we have a system in America, when a woman retires, a man retires, they had the same kind of work, a man gets a lot more retirement than a woman because they paid in more because they were paid more during their lifetime.

This system is wrong, it is unjust, and it threatens the economic security of our families. The fact is millions of American families are dependent on a woman's paycheck just to get by, to put food on the table, to pay for childcare, to deal with rising health care costs.

In today's economy, few families have a stay-at-home mother. In fact, 71 percent of mothers are in the labor force. They are a major contributor to their familie's income. Two-thirds of mothers bring home at least one-quarter of their familie's earnings and in more than 4 of 10 families with children, a woman is the majority or sole breadwinner.

That means in today's economy, when a mother earns less than her male colleagues, her family must sacrifice basic necessities, as well as face greater difficulty for these kids to save for college, afford a home, live the American dream. The lifetime of earning losses all women face, including those who are without children or whose children are grown, affects not only their well-being during their working lives, as I said earlier, but it affects their ability to save and have a decent retirement.

The evidence shows that discrimination accounts for much of the pay gap. In fact, according to one study, when we look at all the reasons there is a wage gap--we have race, 2.4 percent; 3.5 percent union status; labor force experience; industry category; occupational category--41 percent unexplained. They cannot explain why it is. The fact is, that is because of discrimination. It is because our laws have not done enough to prevent this discrimination from occurring. That is why the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act was a critical first step. That is why it is important to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act.

That bill was introduced last week by Senator Mikulski. I am proud to be an original cosponsor. She has always championed that. What that does is start to close a lot of the loopholes and barriers to effective enforcement in our existing law to close that 41 percent unexplained gap. We need to strengthen penalties and give women the tools they need to confront discrimination.

It is outrageous that the Senate has not yet passed the Paycheck Fairness Act. In the last two Congresses this bill got more than a majority of support. In 2010 58 United States Senators, a large majority, voted to pass this legislation. If we had 58 votes, why didn't we get it? Because of Republican obstructionism, we could not even proceed to debate the bill. This was a filibuster on a motion to proceed to the bill. We got 58 votes, but we could not even debate it.

Since we just went through a recent debate on rules reform, I want the American people to understand this. The Republicans, the minority party has continuously prevented the Senate from even considering the issue of unequal wages and gender discrimination. Millions of women and their families are concerned about the fact that they get paid less than their male colleagues. It is unfair; it is unjust. Nevertheless, repeatedly, the Republicans have filibustered even debating the issue.

Just last week we had a vote in the Senate to change the rules. We made some modifications of the rules. I truly hope those modifications which were made will now enable us to get over this hurdle so we can bring up the Paycheck Fairness Act and debate it. If they want to offer amendments, that is fine, but let's debate it. Let's have amendments and then let's vote to pass the bill. I hope the changes in the rules last week will enable us to do so.

As I said, the Lilly Ledbetter bill was a first step. The Paycheck Fairness Act will start to close some of the loopholes and make sure the penalties will be enforced. But there is one more step which needs to be taken, and I think it is the most critical one of all--equal pay, yes. We have had that since 1963; that is, women and men doing the same job. The Lilly Ledbetter Act allows us to go back and get the back wages that were due, but that is sort of after the fact.

The Paycheck Fairness Act will make sure we have penalties and enforceability. However, there is one other huge, glaring discrimination that is ongoing in our society today against women; that is, as a nation we unjustly devalue jobs traditionally performed by women even when they require comparable skills to the jobs traditionally performed by men.

Today millions of what we call female-dominated jobs, such as social workers, teachers, childcare workers, nurses, those who care for our elderly in assisted living care or in nursing homes--most of these jobs are equivalent in skills and working conditions to male-dominated jobs, but the female-dominated jobs pay significantly less. This is unfair and unjust discrimination.

Why is a housekeeper worth less than a janitor? Why is a maid worth less than a janitor? Eighty-nine percent of maids are female; 67 percent of janitors are male. While the jobs are equivalent in skills, effort, responsibility, and working conditions, the median weekly earnings for a maid are $387 and for a janitor it is $463. Computer- support workers--a job that is 72 percent male--have median weekly earnings of $949. In contrast, secretaries and administrative assistants, which is 96 percent female, have median weekly earnings of $659. Why do we value someone who helps with computers more than someone who makes the entire office function? That is not to say the men are overpaid, it is just to say that jobs we have long considered in our country as ``women's work'' or ``women's jobs'' are grossly underpaid.

Now to address this more subtle, deep-rooted discrimination, today I introduced the Fair Pay Act. As I said, this is a bill I have introduced--along with Congresswoman Norton--every year since 1996. The bill will ensure that employers provide equal pay for jobs that are equivalent in skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions.

People have asked: How do we do that? Well, we have some history. In 1982 the State of Minnesota implemented a pay equity plan for its State, and I think, also, municipal employees. The State found that women were segregated into historically female-dominated jobs and that women's jobs paid 20 percent less than male-dominated jobs. Pay equity wage adjustments

were phased in over 4 years, leading to an average pay increase of $200 per month for women in female-dominated jobs.

In 1983, in my home State of Iowa, the Iowa Legislature--a Republican legislature and a Republican Governor, I might add--passed a bill stipulating that the State shall not discriminate in compensation between predominately male and female jobs deemed to be of comparable worth. That was in 1983. I am proud of Iowa. I just want to say this was passed by a Republican legislature and signed by a Republican Governor.

Toward that end, the State engaged a professional accounting firm to evaluate the value of 800 job classifications in State government. The final recommendations, which were made in April of 1984, proposed that 10,751 employees should be given a pay increase. After being implemented in March 1985, female employees' pay had increased at that time by about 1.5 percent. Think of what that means from 1985 to now and how much more those women are paid over all those years. This can be done as well for the women in this country who are currently being paid less, not because of their skills or education but simply because they are in undervalued ``female jobs.'' Making sure they receive their real worth will make a real difference for them and the family who rely on their wages.

Again, many of these jobs are jobs that we don't know what we would do without them. Have you ever visited someone in your family who was in a nursing home? Who is taking care of those people? Women. If we take someone who is in a situation like that, they have to lift and move heavy people. They have to be strong, and they care for people. Then we look at truckdrivers. Most truckdrivers are men. Truckdrivers have power steering and power brakes. A person doesn't have to be strong to drive a truck. They are making a lot more money than that woman who is working in a nursing home and taking care of our grandparents. Why? Skills, effort, responsibility, and working conditions are about the same.

What my bill would do would be very simple. It would require employers to publicly disclose their job categories and their pay scales. Got it? Employers would publicly disclose their job categories and pay scales without requiring specific information on individual employees. I am not asking anyone to say what they are paying an individual employee. We just want to know job categories and pay scales. If we give women information about what their male colleagues are earning, they can insist on a better deal for themselves in the workplace.

Right now women who believe they are the victim of pay discrimination must file a lawsuit and endure a drawn-out legal discovery process to find out whether they make less than the man working beside them. With pay statistics readily available, this process could be avoided. In fact, I remember when Lilly Ledbetter first testified before our committee--the committee I now chair and the committee on which the distinguished occupant of the chair is proud to serve.

I had provided Lilly Ledbetter information on the Fair Pay Act--the one I am talking about. I asked her if the Fair Pay Act had been law, would it have averted her wage discrimination case. She made it very clear that had she had the information about pay scales, which our bill provides, this would have given her the information she needed to insist on being paid a fair salary from the beginning rather than having to resort to litigation years after the discrimination began.

Four years after President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, let's make sure what happened to Lilly never happens again by recommitting ourselves to eliminating discrimination in the workplace and making equal pay for equivalent work a reality.

I have introduced this bill in every Congress since 1996. We get focused on Lilly Ledbetter, and that is important. We are focused on paycheck fairness as well. Let's think about the millions of American women out there who are in these traditional women's jobs which require the skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions that are similar to a man and yet they are grossly underpaid.

If Minnesota and Iowa--and there may be some other States I don't know about; I just know about those two. If they can do it--and they did this in the 1980s for State employees as well as municipal employees in Minnesota--surely we can do this nationwide. If we really want to stop the discrimination in pay in this country between women and men, the Fair Pay Act is the one that will do it.

I am going to continue to push for this as long as I am here. Hopefully, we can have some hearings on it again, which I will, and hopefully we can begin to move on it.

Madam President, on January 29, 2009, President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay

Act. It was a proud day and I was there for that. A critical law, the first legislation signed into law by President Obama after his first election, reversed the outrageous Supreme Court decision in Ledbetter v Goodyear and made clear that a worker such as Lilly Ledbetter, who does not learn of her pay inequities for years, still had recourse to challenge her wage discrimination.

Today we celebrate the anniversary of the enactment of this important law, but at the same time we must recognize it was only a first step. We need to do much more to ensure that all workers in our society are paid fairly for their work and are not shortchanged because of the their gender, race or other personal characteristic. That is why, 4 years after enactment of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, I am proud to introduce once again the Fair Pay Act, a bill I have introduced in every Congress since 1996.

Let me give some background. In 1963, Congress enacted the Equal Pay Act to end unfair discrimination against women in the workplace. At that time, 25 million female workers earned just 60 percent of the average pay for men. While we have made progress toward the goal of true pay equity fully a half century later, too many women still do not get paid what men do for the same or nearly the same work. Let's be clear about this. The Equal Pay Act of 1963 has to do with women doing the same jobs as men. But still, on average, as we know, for every $1 a full-time male worker earns, a woman earns just 77 cents. So we have gone from 60 cents, in all those 60 years, to 77 cents for every $1 a man makes.

What does that translate into? You might say, OK, 7 cents is that a big deal? Yes, it is. Over a lifetime of work it means an average of $400,000 that a woman loses because of the unequal pay practices.

I will say that again later on, but that $400,000 is not just the pay she loses during her lifetime. Think about the retirement benefits that woman loses because she has been underpaid all those years. That is why we have a system in America, when a woman retires, a man retires, they had the same kind of work, a man gets a lot more retirement than a woman because they paid in more because they were paid more during their lifetime.

This system is wrong, it is unjust, and it threatens the economic security of our families. The fact is millions of American families are dependent on a woman's paycheck just to get by, to put food on the table, to pay for childcare, to deal with rising health care costs.

In today's economy, few families have a stay-at-home mother. In fact, 71 percent of mothers are in the labor force. They are a major contributor to their familie's income. Two-thirds of mothers bring home at least one-quarter of their familie's earnings and in more than 4 of 10 families with children, a woman is the majority or sole breadwinner.

That means in today's economy, when a mother earns less than her male colleagues, her family must sacrifice basic necessities, as well as face greater difficulty for these kids to save for college, afford a home, live the American dream. The lifetime of earning losses all women face, including those who are without children or whose children are grown, affects not only their well-being during their working lives, as I said earlier, but it affects their ability to save and have a decent retirement.

The evidence shows that discrimination accounts for much of the pay gap. In fact, according to one study, when we look at all the reasons there is a wage gap--we have race, 2.4 percent; 3.5 percent union status; labor force experience; industry category; occupational category--41 percent unexplained. They cannot explain why it is. The fact is, that is because of discrimination. It is because our laws have not done enough to prevent this discrimination from occurring. That is why the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act was a critical first step. That is why it is important to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act.

That bill was introduced last week by Senator Mikulski. I am proud to be an original cosponsor. She has always championed that. What that does is start to close a lot of the loopholes and barriers to effective enforcement in our existing law to close that 41 percent unexplained gap. We need to strengthen penalties and give women the tools they need to confront discrimination.

It is outrageous that the Senate has not yet passed the Paycheck Fairness Act. In the last two Congresses this bill got more than a majority of support. In 2010 58 United States Senators, a large majority, voted to pass this legislation. If we had 58 votes, why didn't we get it? Because of Republican obstructionism, we could not even proceed to debate the bill. This was a filibuster on a motion to proceed to the bill. We got 58 votes, but we could not even debate it.

Since we just went through a recent debate on rules reform, I want the American people to understand this. The Republicans, the minority party has continuously prevented the Senate from even considering the issue of unequal wages and gender discrimination. Millions of women and their families are concerned about the fact that they get paid less than their male colleagues. It is unfair; it is unjust. Nevertheless, repeatedly, the Republicans have filibustered even debating the issue.

Just last week we had a vote in the Senate to change the rules. We made some modifications of the rules. I truly hope those modifications which were made will now enable us to get over this hurdle so we can bring up the Paycheck Fairness Act and debate it. If they want to offer amendments, that is fine, but let's debate it. Let's have amendments and then let's vote to pass the bill. I hope the changes in the rules last week will enable us to do so.

As I said, the Lilly Ledbetter bill was a first step. The Paycheck Fairness Act will start to close some of the loopholes and make sure the penalties will be enforced. But there is one more step which needs to be taken, and I think it is the most critical one of all--equal pay, yes. We have had that since 1963; that is, women and men doing the same job. The Lilly Ledbetter Act allows us to go back and get the back wages that were due, but that is sort of after the fact.

The Paycheck Fairness Act will make sure we have penalties and enforceability. However, there is one other huge, glaring discrimination that is ongoing in our society today against women; that is, as a nation we unjustly devalue jobs traditionally performed by women even when they require comparable skills to the jobs traditionally performed by men.

Today millions of what we call female-dominated jobs, such as social workers, teachers, childcare workers, nurses, those who care for our elderly in assisted living care or in nursing homes--most of these jobs are equivalent in skills and working conditions to male-dominated jobs, but the female-dominated jobs pay significantly less. This is unfair and unjust discrimination.

Why is a housekeeper worth less than a janitor? Why is a maid worth less than a janitor? Eighty-nine percent of maids are female; 67 percent of janitors are male. While the jobs are equivalent in skills, effort, responsibility, and working conditions, the median weekly earnings for a maid are $387 and for a janitor it is $463. Computer- support workers--a job that is 72 percent male--have median weekly earnings of $949. In contrast, secretaries and administrative assistants, which is 96 percent female, have median weekly earnings of $659. Why do we value someone who helps with computers more than someone who makes the entire office function? That is not to say the men are overpaid, it is just to say that jobs we have long considered in our country as ``women's work'' or ``women's jobs'' are grossly underpaid.

Now to address this more subtle, deep-rooted discrimination, today I introduced the Fair Pay Act. As I said, this is a bill I have introduced--along with Congresswoman Norton--every year since 1996. The bill will ensure that employers provide equal pay for jobs that are equivalent in skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions.

People have asked: How do we do that? Well, we have some history. In 1982 the State of Minnesota implemented a pay equity plan for its State, and I think, also, municipal employees. The State found that women were segregated into historically female-dominated jobs and that women's jobs paid 20 percent less than male-dominated jobs. Pay equity wage adjustments

were phased in over 4 years, leading to an average pay increase of $200 per month for women in female-dominated jobs.

In 1983, in my home State of Iowa, the Iowa Legislature--a Republican legislature and a Republican Governor, I might add--passed a bill stipulating that the State shall not discriminate in compensation between predominately male and female jobs deemed to be of comparable worth. That was in 1983. I am proud of Iowa. I just want to say this was passed by a Republican legislature and signed by a Republican Governor.

Toward that end, the State engaged a professional accounting firm to evaluate the value of 800 job classifications in State government. The final recommendations, which were made in April of 1984, proposed that 10,751 employees should be given a pay increase. After being implemented in March 1985, female employees' pay had increased at that time by about 1.5 percent. Think of what that means from 1985 to now and how much more those women are paid over all those years. This can be done as well for the women in this country who are currently being paid less, not because of their skills or education but simply because they are in undervalued ``female jobs.'' Making sure they receive their real worth will make a real difference for them and the family who rely on their wages.

Again, many of these jobs are jobs that we don't know what we would do without them. Have you ever visited someone in your family who was in a nursing home? Who is taking care of those people? Women. If we take someone who is in a situation like that, they have to lift and move heavy people. They have to be strong, and they care for people. Then we look at truckdrivers. Most truckdrivers are men. Truckdrivers have power steering and power brakes. A person doesn't have to be strong to drive a truck. They are making a lot more money than that woman who is working in a nursing home and taking care of our grandparents. Why? Skills, effort, responsibility, and working conditions are about the same.

What my bill would do would be very simple. It would require employers to publicly disclose their job categories and their pay scales. Got it? Employers would publicly disclose their job categories and pay scales without requiring specific information on individual employees. I am not asking anyone to say what they are paying an individual employee. We just want to know job categories and pay scales. If we give women information about what their male colleagues are earning, they can insist on a better deal for themselves in the workplace.

Right now women who believe they are the victim of pay discrimination must file a lawsuit and endure a drawn-out legal discovery process to find out whether they make less than the man working beside them. With pay statistics readily available, this process could be avoided. In fact, I remember when Lilly Ledbetter first testified before our committee--the committee I now chair and the committee on which the distinguished occupant of the chair is proud to serve.

I had provided Lilly Ledbetter information on the Fair Pay Act--the one I am talking about. I asked her if the Fair Pay Act had been law, would it have averted her wage discrimination case. She made it very clear that had she had the information about pay scales, which our bill provides, this would have given her the information she needed to insist on being paid a fair salary from the beginning rather than having to resort to litigation years after the discrimination began.

Four years after President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, let's make sure what happened to Lilly never happens again by recommitting ourselves to eliminating discrimination in the workplace and making equal pay for equivalent work a reality.

I have introduced this bill in every Congress since 1996. We get focused on Lilly Ledbetter, and that is important. We are focused on paycheck fairness as well. Let's think about the millions of American women out there who are in these traditional women's jobs which require the skill, effort, responsibility, and working conditions that are similar to a man and yet they are grossly underpaid.

If Minnesota and Iowa--and there may be some other States I don't know about; I just know about those two. If they can do it--and they did this in the 1980s for State employees as well as municipal employees in Minnesota--surely we can do this nationwide. If we really want to stop the discrimination in pay in this country between women and men, the Fair Pay Act is the one that will do it.

I am going to continue to push for this as long as I am here. Hopefully, we can have some hearings on it again, which I will, and hopefully we can begin to move on it.

Mr. President, I wish to announce that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions will meet in open session on Thursday, January 31, 2013, at 10 a.m. in room SD-430 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building to conduct a hearing entitled ``Pension Savings: Are Workers Saving Enough for Retirement?''

For further information regarding this meeting, please contact Michael Kreps of the committee staff on (202) 224-5111.