Employee Wages and Salary: Prohibits public employer, private employer, or employment agency from engaging in certain activities relating to wages & salary; authorizes public employer, private employer, or employment agency to confirm prospective employee's wage or salary history under certain conditions; requires public employer, private employer, or employment agency to maintain certain records for specified time period; provides administrative, injunctive, & civil relief; provides civil penalties.

Why I Filed This Bill (by Representative Joseph): The Wage Fairness Act is laser-focused on remediating systemic hiring and pay practices that contribute to the wage gap. In Florida, women earn just 85 cents for every dollar a man makes, and the gap is even worse for Black and Latina women, who earn 63 cents and 59 cents on the dollar, respectively. Focused on Equal Pay, this bill: 1. prohibits employers from relying on salary history to set pay as this outdated employer practice is a significant driver of gender and racial wage gaps within organizations; and 2. requires employers to include pay ranges in job announcements because when pay is set in secret, wage gaps arise because employers are not held accountable for setting fair pay. As an effort to level the playing field for worker pay, this legislation ensures transparency in disclosing pay ranges, protects against discrimination for those who’ve historically earned less for performing the same work, and keeps employers accountable for implementing straightforward practices that promote fair pay. In so doing, this bill releases workers–especially women, minorities, and poor people–from being stuck forever in a cycle of poverty by simply insisting that all people earn equal pay for equal work.