Today is Black Women’s Equal Pay Day, which means that a Black woman in the U.S. would have to work all of 2018 and up until today to match what a white man made in 2018. Across the country, on average, Black women earn 64 cents for every $1 earned by a white man, and Native and Latinx women face even steeper disparities.
At Lyft, we know there is always more work to be done in striving for pay fairness, which is why we are constantly building towards a more inclusive workplace and conduct an annual third-party audit to ensure that our pay philosophy and practices transcend race and gender.
Monica Poindexter, Lyft’s Head of Inclusion and Diversity, speaks to her personal experience with equal pay in her own career:
My earliest memory of thinking about pay is when I was 13 and started a summer job at my mother’s office. My mom required me to interview to discuss my summer projects, working hours, and my pay -- which was the part of this conversation I dreaded most. I remember uncomfortably throwing out a rate, and by the look on her face, I knew I was way off the mark. My mom made me research to understand the principles behind pay. In that moment, I saw my mom through a different lens -- as a real businesswoman, and more importantly, an advocate.
When I was 22, I was offered a full time position after interning with a company for four years. Honestly, I was just happy to have a job offer before college graduation and accepted the offer immediately. Later, I found out that men with less education and less relevant experience had negotiated for more pay. At that point, I wish I had remembered what my mom had taught me, and had chosen a company that valued pay fairness.
Thankfully, I learned early in my career to research the culture, policies, and practices of companies I would consider working for. Perhaps this is why I’m so proud of Lyft’s practices underlying pay fairness and our commitment to help prevent systemic gender or race-based compensation disparities.
- Monica Poindexter, Head of Inclusion & Diversity