Independent Student Newspaper for the University of Texas at San Antonio

The Paisano

Independent Student Newspaper for the University of Texas at San Antonio

The Paisano

Independent Student Newspaper for the University of Texas at San Antonio

The Paisano

Bake sale for a cause

Now bake sale prices

On April 8, the National Organization for Women (NOW) hosted a bake sale on campus to bring awareness to Equal Pay Day, which highlights wage disparities between men and women. NOW took Equal Pay Day a step further by also highlighting disparities among different races. White men were charged a full dollar for baked goods, white women $0.77, black men less than that and so on.

NOW president Dylan Verdi planned this event and shared how the prices were determined.

She stated that, “$0.77 is what a white woman will make to a white man’s dollar, and when you break it down further by race people of different racial identities make less or more,” Verdi noted. “I think it’s important to recognize those intersections of race and gender.”

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, white men stand as the one dollar benchmark because they make up the majority in the workplace. Asian men actually tend to make more than white men, and Asian women typically make $.87 to a white man’s dollar.

As the statistics are broken down even more, it can be found that “African-American women make something like $0.63 or $0.64 to a white man’s dollar; Hispanic women make $0.53 or $0.54,” Verdi shared.

The bake sale hosted by NOW was the first one in the club’s history, and they plan to make it a tradition.

“We are going to leave that up to the person to identify themselves,” Verdi said. “I think it kind of turns the tables and it gives somebody who might be more disenfranchised more purchasing power. If you make more, you pay more.”

Verdi fully expected feedback from both ends of the spectrum to come forth during the event. After giving away free condoms on Valentine’s Day, NOW received some negative comments on Twitter, as well as support.

“I’ve seen these types of things…selling people goods for different prices based off of something,” Verdi said. “Those definitely have gotten attention – mostly negative.”

According to Verdi, The bake sale received good feedback overall, with only one white male starting a verbal debate concerning the price differences. “We had a lot of people who were super excited about the prices, and we had a few people give small donations because they loved it so much,” Verdi said.

“We are constantly trying to plan things that point out to people the injustices in society,” Verdi said. “When they do get pointed out, it makes people uncomfortable.”

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