Brazilian law will impose a fine for different salaries for men and women in the same function

A bill to be presented on Wednesday (8) by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) foresees that companies that pay different salaries to men and women performing the same functions can be fined.

Planning Minister Simone Tebet gave the information to Rádio Eldorado, and excerpts were published by Estadão newspaper.

According to the minister, the new bill advances one of the Labor Laws Consolidation (CLT) norms that already guaranteed equal salaries but did not establish penalties in case of non-compliance.

Tebet says that the 2017 labor reform included the possibility of a fine but that “amazingly, it is up to 50% of the highest Social Security benefit, or up to five minimum wages, a little less than that.”

“So the bad employer, the one with bad faith, says: ‘Well, it’s better that I break the law because, if I receive a fine, it’s very small considering the wage difference that I will pay for a year, for two years, or longer,'” explains the minister.

Wage equality between men and women was one of Tebet’s main issues in the 2022 presidential campaign and a condition for supporting Lula in the second round.

Tebet says that the project presented by Lula at 11 am will “really impose this obligation of wage equality by making it hard on the pocket, increasing the fine and establishing rules.

The minister says she is aware of the resistance that the text may face in Congress, just as it occurred in the labor reform of 2017, but that because it is a priority project of the president, it may have a more feasible path.

“I am very optimistic because it is the first time that it really comes out emphatically from the mouth of a president of the Republic that this is a priority project of his government,” she added, saying that there will be enforcement and information campaigns to make the law be complied with.

With information from Gazeta do Povo