In a recent World Bank working paper entitled Gender Laws, we use this database to compare economies where women have the same legal rights as men with those where the legal gender gap is large. One of the goals of this research is to deepen our understanding of how gender discrimination through the law affects women`s economic opportunities. The Human Rights Act also guarantees rights, including to education, health care and social security, which have the potential to redistribute and thus reduce inequalities. The period of the 1940s is referred to as the “Great Compression,” a period during which wage inequality declined. The demand for low- and medium-skilled workers led to an increase in their incomes after the war. Meanwhile, the highest wages were unchanged before World War II and declined significantly during the war. Economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez said this was likely due to “high progressive taxation.” The Fair Housing Act of 1968 — part of the civil rights legislation enacted by President Lyndon B. Johnson following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. — led to the creation of the Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity Office.
The Act prevented discrimination in most housing-related activities, including renting, buying and lending mortgages. By improving minority access to housing in the United States, laws were created that provided a platform to address income inequality. And sometimes our legal and judicial systems even perpetuate these inequalities. Racism can be a pervasive or institutional problem in criminal justice systems in many ways, including, for example, racial bias in sentencing and mass incarceration. The Sentencing Project points out that in the United States, “African-American men are six times more likely to be incarcerated than white men.” The broader Civil Rights Act has also made great strides in eliminating income inequality more directly. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, for example, eliminated discrimination based on race, color, or national origin for programs that receive federal assistance, which covers a large portion of educational institutions in the United States. Class assignments and grading. And Title VII prohibits discrimination in employment on the basis of race, color, religion, sex and national origin. Restrictions on women`s legal capacity weaken their decision-making capacity.
If women cannot decide for themselves where they want to go, travel or live on a daily basis, they may find it difficult to get to work or conduct business transactions. Unequal access to legal assistance, representation and other legal bodies, which may or may not be enshrined in law, constitutes a particular restriction on the rights of certain parts of the Community. The conditions for granting legal aid must also be assessed. In cases of domestic violence in the UK, women`s rights groups point out that survivors often do not have access to legal aid because they are tied to assets, which include homes that are in the name of both the survivor and the perpetrator, even if the survivor does not have access to these assets. In May 2020, the European Parliament`s think tank produced an in-depth analysis of discriminatory laws that undermine women`s rights, explaining how legal reforms have been carried out with the aim of accelerating gender equality in legislation around the world, citing Equality Now`s efforts. In 1946, Congress created the Indian Claims Commission to hear Native American claims to stolen land. This organization provided $36 million to 13 groups in 1968. The Hawaiian Homes Commission Act of 1920 aimed to eliminate the inequality created by the colonization of Hawaii. There were farms given to Native Hawaiians for residential, agricultural and grazing purposes. Castellanos Howell says that in many countries, “the culture of legal aid and pro bono work is very weak.” But he and Gold point out that there are often ethical mandates for lawyers to provide pro bono legal services as part of their role in the legal profession.
“We need to work to build a culture of support, to give back to society within the profession,” Gold adds. In this article, income inequality refers not only to a gap in wages earned, but also to the broader inequality of wealth earned from all sources, including rent, donations, pensions, and investments. Wage inequality and wealth inequality, which are linked, have increased dramatically in recent decades. Income inequality in the United States is exceptionally high for a developed economy – and it is rising. The income gap, as measured by the Gini coefficient, has widened for decades, as lower and middle class incomes have grown more slowly than upper-class incomes, concentrating wealth upwards. For example, a report by the Economic Policy Institute indicates that typical CEO compensation increased by 1,007.5% from 1978 to 2018. Over this period, the income of the typical worker increased by 11.9%. The milestones described above are not an exhaustive list of all attempts to address inequality in the United States. Another approach that has attracted interest in recent years is reparations – payments and other measures taken to compensate victims for lost wages, theft and other forms of harm that have undermined the ability to create wealth, among other things.
As a government policy, reparations are a serious attempt to reverse past damage that has had ripple effects, an ongoing influence that promotes some aspects of structural inequality. The United States has offered reparations at several points in its history. In our paper, we examine whether improving women`s legal treatment has contributed to more equitable labour market outcomes. The panel`s estimates based on the WBL dataset show several encouraging correlations: convergence of legal rules of the game between men and women is associated with greater female participation in the labour market, a narrowing of the gender pay gap and lower occupational segregation. On the other hand, other laws have sought to open the door to complaints of discrimination. When it is difficult to file complaints of discriminatory practices, codes of law and court decisions have a limited impact on the ground. The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 was a statute that overturned a court decision limiting when claims could be filed, Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., Inc., 550 U.S. 618 (2007). The law opened up the possibility for people to file complaints of discrimination and seize opportunities.
In debates on economic inequality, human rights are receiving increasing attention. In the UK, the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights – who issued a statement criticising the Conservative government`s austerity policies – and a report by the UK government`s Independent Equality and Human Rights Commission are concerned about the disproportionate impact of economic policies on vulnerable groups – and a report by the Independent Commission for Equality and Human Rights of the British Government. These reports reflect global concerns about fiscal policies, poverty and extreme economic inequality.