fortune + time's up ask the candidates about the issues that matter to working women

Fortune Editors

While presidential candidates answer hundreds of questions about the economy, they’re rarely asked about the economic issues that most directly affect women. In an attempt to move these topics into the mainstream, Fortune has partnered with Time’s Up Now to ask all the 2020 presidential candidates—including President Donald Trump—a series of questions about their policy positions related to gender equity and working families. 

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Thirteen of the remaining 15 candidates, as well as four who have since left the race, participated in the project, which published Jan. 28, 2020. Two—Republican primary challengers Bill Weld, former governor of Massachusetts, and Joe Walsh, former Illinois congressman—chose not to participate.

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As a 501(c)(4) organization dedicated to promoting safe working conditions for women, Time’s Up Now faces limitations on asking primary candidates personalized questions. For more context on candidates’ records and personal experience with these issues, please see this <a href="https://fortune.com/2020/01/28/2020-candidates-record-womens-issues">companion piece</a> from Fortune. —Emma Hinchliffe

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Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) joined Fortune for a video interview. The following transcript of that conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave, and if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Bennet: We make it too hard for people to work in this country, and when people have to deal with a sick child or a sick parent, or their own illness, often they [lose their job]. We’re the only industrialized country in the world that doesn’t have paid family leave, and we should pass it here in this country. The starting place for it should be among a group of progressive bills that we need to pass to better support working people in this country, including increasing the child tax credit, increasing the earned income tax credit, passing paid family leave, and passing an increase to the minimum wage. Those four things together would make a massive difference to families in this country.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

I think affordable childcare is a huge problem in the United States. I used to be the superintendent of the Denver Public Schools, and this was a big issue for parents all across Denver. Central to my economic proposals in this election is the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/690">American Family Act</a>, which is a massive increase to the child tax credit. It would increase the child tax credit to $3,600, pay it out on a monthly basis for kids 6 and under, and parents would get $300 a month. Kids 6 and older, $250 a month. It would decrease childhood poverty in America by 40% and allow parents to buy early childhood education if they need it, housing if they need it. 

At least from the vantage point of the kids that I work for in the Denver Public Schools and their parents, this would be a much more significant policy to pursue and to enact than certain policies in this race that are described as progressive, like Medicare for All.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

I don’t think we’ve gone far enough to address sexual harassment. We did a little bit of work in Congress last year to make things more transparent, make it less easy for members of Congress to settle these kinds of lawsuits or actions in the dark, and that’s good. But we can always go farther, and we need to continue to go farther. Eight-five percent of women in the workforce say they’ve been sexually harassed, and as long as that’s true, it’s clear that we haven’t gone far enough. 

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

People need to understand we still have a huge pay gap. I was really pleased that the very first bill I voted for when I became a United States senator 10 years ago was the <a href="https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/publications/brochure-equal_pay_and_ledbetter_act.cfm">Lilly Ledbetter [Fair Pay] Act</a>, which was an attempt to try to equalize pay in this country. But still, women earn only 82% of what men earn. Women of color, it’s even worse than that. So there is much, much more for us to do.

We need to pass the Paycheck Fairness Act and continue to legislate federally to make sure that employers aren’t taking advantage of working women. We need to illuminate the gap more so that people can understand that it’s really there. I think companies should post [their gender wage gaps]. And I think the Senate should post it. 

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

I’m not sure whether I support legislating [representation of women and underrepresented groups on corporate boards]. I’d need to think about that. But my own experience is that the worst decisions I make are the ones that I make by myself in my house. And the best decisions I make are ones that I make with people with contending differences of opinion, with different perspectives and different experiences.

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work?

By having paid family leave, we need to make sure that people can come through their pregnancies and come back to work on the other side. People shouldn’t be disadvantaged in any way because they become pregnant, because they’re having a child. There is legislation that would strengthen the antidiscrimination laws to cover pregnancy, and I think that that would be an important thing for us to pass.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Michael Bennet

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Former Vice President Joe Biden responded to questions from Fortune and Time’s Up via email. The following transcript of that exchange has been edited for length and clarity. 

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave, and if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Biden: Absolutely. When I lost my first wife and baby daughter in a car accident, I became a single parent to my two young sons. I’ve taken care of aging parents. I know how hard it is to raise a family, and what it’s like to take care of a sick family member. American workers deserve to know they can keep their families afloat if they have to take care of a sick family member.  

It’s time for our federal government to get its priorities straight, so that workers can care for the people they love when they need it most. I was proud to fight for the <a href="https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fmla">Family and Medical Leave Act</a>, landmark legislation that created important workplace protections and granted 12 weeks of [unpaid] leave to working families. But we need to go further—I believe the United States should guarantee 12 weeks of paid sick and family leave for workers. 

I support the coverage and protections in Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s (D-N.Y.) <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/463/text">FAMILY Act</a>, which recognizes that workers need paid time off to care for newborns or newly adopted children, to take care of themselves or family members with serious health conditions, or to care for military family members and help them prepare for deployments. And it won’t just help some workers. Part-time workers, independent contractors, workers who change jobs, and workers at small employers will be able to take the time they need, too. Instead of instituting a payroll tax on employers and employees like the FAMILY Act does, I will pay for this proposal by returning the estate tax to 2009 levels. 

One of the highlights of my career as a public servant has been standing with survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault; they shouldn’t be left behind here either. As President, I will guarantee paid leave for survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking who need time to seek physical or mental care, seek counsel, find new housing, or take other action related to the violence they experienced. 

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

Ensuring that every family has access to safe, affordable childcare is one of the best things we can do for working parents. Everywhere I go, I meet people who say they can’t afford childcare. When I’m President, parents will get up to $8,000 in tax credits to offset the cost of childcare. All 3- and 4-year-olds will be able to attend high-quality, universal prekindergarten at no cost, and after-school programs and community centers will have additional funding to serve kids when school isn’t in session. 

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

Women need to feel safe no matter what. No matter where they are—at home, at school, at work, and in their communities. I have spent my entire career fighting for women’s safety, starting in 1990, when I wrote the Violence Against Women Act. At the time, domestic violence was considered a private family matter. Because of that landmark legislation, and countless survivors who have spoken out, that is no longer the case today. Women who face violence at home or on campus know that they are not alone—that they have a way forward. 

I’m proud of what our nation has done to reduce sexual violence, and as President, I’ll double down on those efforts to make sure that women are safe at work. First, I’ll push Congress to pass the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1082">BE HEARD Act</a>. This bill takes a comprehensive approach to workplace harassment. It holds all employers accountable. It funds research so we better understand how to stop harassment in the workplace from the get-go. And, it closes loopholes so that all workers—not just some—are protected.

Second, I’ll protect domestic workers from harassment and discrimination by passing the National <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/2112/text">Domestic Workers Bill of Rights</a>, so that these workers, many of whom are women or people of color, are not left behind, and instead are treated with dignity and respect.

Third, I’ll end mandatory arbitration clauses imposed by employers on workers so that workers who experience harassment can have their day in court. No one should be forced to sign a nondisclosure agreement that silences them and prevents them from speaking out about harassment or discrimination.

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women and working mothers?

It is unacceptable that there are employers paying women less than men for the same work. As President, I will finish the Obama-Biden administration’s work on ending unequal pay. The very first bill the Obama-Biden administration signed was the <a href="https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/publications/brochure-equal_pay_and_ledbetter_act.cfm">Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act</a>, which made it easier for women to fight back if they were unfairly paid less than their male coworkers. We also protected more workers against retaliation for discussing wages and required employers to collect and report wage gaps to the federal government. As President, I will build on this critical work by signing into law the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/7/text">Paycheck Fairness Act</a>. 

And, recognizing that women make up the majority of minimum-wage workers, I’ll stop the exploitation of low-wage workers. I’ll increase the minimum wage to $15 per hour, support the elimination of the tipped minimum wage, and dismantle the barriers to higher-paying jobs for these workers. 

I believe the United States should be leading on [pay equity disclosures and enforcing penalties for unequal pay]. Improving transparency is one essential step to ending the pay gap between men and women. The Obama-Biden administration expanded requirements for employers to report pay information to improve the federal government’s ability to take enforcement action against employers who are discriminating and change the culture around pay transparency. 

As President, I’ll make it easier for workers to join together in class action lawsuits, shift the burden to employers to prove pay gaps exist for job-related reasons, and increase penalties against companies that discriminate, as called for in the Paycheck Fairness Act. And I’ll hold companies accountable by increasing funding for investigators and enforcement actions.

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

Make no mistake: Discrimination and bias hold back families, companies, and our economy. It is in everyone’s best interest for our workforce to look like the rest of the country, from the stockroom to the boardroom.

The lack of women at these higher levels is partially a pipeline problem. As President, I would push for policies that would make it easier for women to pursue management and leadership roles—by expanding access to affordable childcare, guaranteeing workers 12 weeks of paid family leave, supporting flexible work schedules, and—importantly—putting an end to harassment and discrimination.

But corporations need to take a hard look at their corporate culture and practices, which is why my administration will push for transparency and also promote best practices for companies to address bias and discrimination.

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work? 

When businesses refuse to give workers these small accommodations, pregnant women are forced to choose between work and their health. This is all too common in American workplaces, especially in industries where jobs are inflexible and physically demanding—and more likely to be held by low-income women, women of color, or immigrant women. That’s why I support the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/2417?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22Pregnant+Workers+Fairness+Act%22%5D%7D">Pregnant Workers Fairness Act</a>, which requires employers to provide reasonable workplace accommodations when their employees’ abilities are limited by pregnancy, childbirth, or a related medical condition.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Joe Biden

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Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg answered questions sent by Fortune and Time’s Up via email. The following transcript has been edited for length and clarity. 

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave, and if so, what is your proposal to make it happen? 

Bloomberg: Yes. As President, I will work with Congress to pass legislation that guarantees American workers 12 weeks of paid family leave.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

I will increase funding for the <a href="https://www.acf.hhs.gov/archive/occ/resource/child-care-and-development-fund">Child Care and Development Fund</a> and expand access to quality affordable childcare.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

I have zero tolerance for sexual harassment. As President, I will reinvigorate the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. I also will work with Congress to impose limits on mandatory arbitration agreements so that employees have the power to take employers to court for harassment or discrimination of any kind.

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

The pay gap is not fair, it's not right, and as President I will work hard to end it. I will raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, indexed to inflation—studies show that raising the minimum wage will disproportionately help women. 

I will support an SEC rule requiring public companies to report on hiring, pay, and procurement by race and gender.

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

I’ve always believed organizations make better decisions when people with a range of different backgrounds and experiences are at the table. That’s why I’ve been committed to hiring and promoting women and people from underrepresented groups throughout my career. 

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work? 

I have zero tolerance for pregnancy-related discrimination. As I said above, as President, I will reinvigorate the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. I also will work with Congress to impose limits on mandatory arbitration agreements so that employees have the power to take employers to court for harassment or discrimination of any kind.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Michael Bloomberg

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Former Mayor of South Bend, Ind., Pete Buttigieg responded to questions sent by Fortune and Time’s Up in a video filmed by his campaign. The following transcript of that video response has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave, and if so, what is your proposal to make it happen? 

Buttigieg: The time has come for the United States to join the nations in the world that provide paid family leave. And making sure that medical leave and family leave are available to everybody will be a priority in my administration.

In South Bend, in my administration, we brought for the first time paid family leave to city workers. Now the time has come to make sure that every American enjoys that. It’s why we not only need to pass the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/463/text">FAMILY Act</a>, we need to go beyond it with enhancements like making sure that chosen family members, grandparents, grandchildren, and siblings qualify.

Because families take many forms. The bottom line is we need to make sure that this is available to everyone in our country. It’s part of what it means to be able to support workers and support the American people wherever they are. And I won’t rest until we’ve delivered it.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

We need to deliver affordable and safe childcare to every family. And we’ve got a lot of work to do as a country to make that a reality. It’s not going to get fixed without deferral funds. I’m insisting that we use federal funds in order to make sure that childcare is free to those who are at or near the poverty line, and affordable for all families, not rising above 7% of income.

Right now in many places, it is as expensive to provide a year of childcare as it is a year of college. This is making it harder for so many Americans, especially women, to remain in the workforce. And some find that all of their earnings in the workforce just go to supporting the childcare that they need in order to be able to work.

This is no way to continue, and it will improve when we make those needed investments that I believe will more than pay for themselves in the long-run benefit to children and families across America.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

I am proposing that we invest $10 billion over the coming decade to end workplace harassment. In particular, this means increasing the resources available to protect employees through the EEOC [Equal Employment Opportunity Commission].

We need to act to ensure that no workplace is one where these kinds of harassment diminish people’s opportunity to thrive. And in particular, there’s evidence that this is part of what’s causing the gender pay gap in America.

Not only must we have better enforcement, but we must have transparency, high standards, and begin by ensuring that even through education we establish a different culture that sets a tone that in the private and public sector, anywhere in America, workplace sexual harassment is completely unacceptable.

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

Left alone, the current trends suggest that the gender pay gap for all women, including women of color, won’t be closed for another 200 years. That’s unacceptable. We need to close that gap in our time. How can we do it? Well partly it’s that enforcement to make sure that when you have like-for-like jobs that are not being compensated equally, that there is an opportunity to enforce and take action.

But it’s not just that kind of apples-to-apples discrimination that’s driving the pay gap. It’s the fact that many areas and lines of work that disproportionately have women or have more women of color are less likely to have workplace or labor protections. It's one of the reasons why we need to make sure that domestic workers, farmworkers, and others are able to get the same kinds of opportunities to organize and seek workplace protections as in other professions. 

We need to act against harassment, and we need to make sure that when we add childcare, we do it with the intention to prevent women from having to leave the workforce and find that when they return, they’re at a disadvantage and for the rest of their careers not able to catch up when it comes to compensation. 

On everything from direct pay discrimination to the structure of social, political, and economic empowerment of women, we have to act to make sure that we are intentionally closing the pay gap. And in particular, the way that the pay gap affects women who are at the intersection of other patterns of exclusion, like LGBTQ women, and women of color, and Native women. So that this is truly a country where there is equal pay for equal work.

I am proposing that we require employers to report pay data by quintile, broken down by race and gender, so that consumers, employees, the public, and enforcers can see what is happening with these kinds of gender pay gaps. 

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not?

It’s critical that we increase the representation and leadership of women in corporate governance structures and especially corporate boards. I will use the institutional power of the federal government as an investor and as a purchaser to make sure that we are promoting gender diversity on corporate boards, which by the way has been shown to increase not only workplace fairness, but the actual effectiveness and profitability of organizations. And I’ll also make sure that we are working with banks to require demographic information about lending practices, to make sure that they are doing their part to capitalize women-led organizations. 

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work?

No woman should ever have to risk her economic security in order to take care of her health. This is why we need to pass the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/2417?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22Pregnant+Workers+Fairness+Act%22%5D%7D">Pregnant Workers Fairness Act</a>, to end forms of discrimination that can disadvantage pregnant workers, and update the <a href="https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/statutes/pregnancy.cfm">Pregnancy Discrimination Act</a>, to reflect modern realities in today’s workplace. We need to make sure that women while pregnant, and after returning to work, are supported and accommodated, and that we make sure that we are welcoming and supporting the continued growth, progress, and success of women’s careers before, during, and after pregnancy.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Pete Buttigieg

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Former Rep. John Delaney (D-Md.) joined Fortune for a video interview. The following transcript of that conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave, and if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Delaney: I believe the United States should have mandatory paid family and medical leave. Most developed nations around the world have mandatory paid family leave. We’re one of the few nations that does not. I think it provides dignity to workers. I think it’s part of the social compact that we should have for our citizens and our workers. And I also think it’s actually very smart economic policy and will lead to more economic growth because it puts families and workers in a position where they have that needed flexibility that we all need, from time to time, to take care of a family or a medical emergency.

My plan provides eight weeks of annual paid family leave where workers would receive 60% of their compensation during those eight weeks. And the plan is fully paid for with a very small 25 basis points payroll tax.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

Making sure that families have access to childcare is part of the basic social compact—or at least it should be part of the modern social compact for our families. And I do think it’s smart economic policy. The first thing I propose is a very significant expansion of the child tax credit and the earned income tax credit, which puts more money in the pockets of hardworking Americans and gives them more flexibility around childcare. I’m also in favor of universal pre-K and very significant expansion in early childhood education. Not only do I believe those are in many ways the best investment we make in our future and in our education system, but I think universal early childhood education and certainly universal pre-K alleviate an enormous amount of the burdens around childcare.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

I don’t believe the Congress of the United States or corporate America has gone far enough to address sexual harassment in our country. Let’s start with Congress. One of the things Congress has failed to do is adequately fund the EEOC [Equal Employment Opportunity Commission], which is the most important agency we have in our government to enforce the laws that we have protecting our citizens against workplace discrimination and sexual harassment. For decades it’s been chronically underfunded. We see lots of evidence of huge backlogs within the EEOC. The main institution in our government that is responsible for actually defending people against hostile work environments and sexual harassment has not been supported by the Congress of the United States, and that’s a huge failure.

I also think corporate America needs to lean into this much more. Before I served in Congress, I started two businesses. I took them public, and I was the CEO of two publicly traded companies. This was a really important issue to me, and I wanted to run the kind of company where there was zero tolerance for these kinds of situations. That tone is set at the top by the leadership of these corporations. I think corporate America needs to do more.        

But we also know there are a lot of workers who are on the low end of the pay scale who don’t have support or don’t feel comfortable putting forth the claim. So we need to build not only within our government, but also outside our government, support groups and organizations to support these workers. That’s the only way we’re going to get to the place where we should be, which is where every worker feels safe in their workplace and not subject to discrimination. We need the Congress to do its job, we need the tone at the top to be set by corporate America. And we need institutions and organizations to support workers.

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

We have a huge pay gap in our country with respect to women compared to men, and with respect to people of color compared to white people. And this needs to be addressed. Because it’s not fair, and we’re never going to achieve our potential unless we create the kind of environment where all workers are compensated fairly for the contributions that they make.

One of the things I will do as President is ensure that the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/7/text">Paycheck Fairness Act</a> gets passed. Passing the Equal Rights Amendment where we codify in our Constitution that you can’t have discriminatory law between men and women is another incredibly important thing that we have to do.

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not?

I do support the movement and policies to ensure that this country is represented among the senior decision-makers in corporate America. First, as a matter of fundamental fairness, everyone should have the same opportunity. Second, unless the leadership of major corporations really reflect our society, we’re not going to fulfill our potential. Because those who have the privilege of leading or governing really need to represent the people that they are leading or the people that they are governing. 

We all know that different stakeholders need specific representation. If you don’t have women in leadership, whether in government or in business, issues that are most important to women are not [advocated for]. I do support policies that encourage a future where we see our government and our business—our largest businesses in particular—being reflective of who we are. 

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work?

No one should be discriminated against because they’re pregnant in the workplace. I support laws preventing companies from making discriminatory decisions against individuals who are pregnant, or people who have just had a child and are taking advantage of the appropriate medical leave that comes with having a child.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

John Delaney

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Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) answered questions sent by Fortune and Time’s Up in a video filmed by her campaign. The following transcript of that video response has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave? And if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Gabbard: Unfortunately, there are millions of people all across our country who are living paycheck to paycheck, working hard, but still barely able to make ends meet—living with fear and insecurity that there will be some unexpected expense that affects their families, that affects their loved ones. Without a national family leave program in place, really what that means to many Americans across this country is they’ve got to make a choice: a choice between taking care of their family or ensuring their financial security.

That’s a very difficult, even an impossible choice for anyone to make. This is why I support paid family leave, and why I’m a co-sponsor of the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/1185">FAMILY Act</a> in Congress, to make sure that this is not a choice that any American has to make—and that every American can live with that peace of mind that when there is a newborn that’s come into their family, or a loved one gets sick, that they’ll be able to go and provide that care during that important time for their family, without fear of being put out on the street or going bankrupt.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

There are two main ways that I would approach doing this. Number one is implementing universal basic income that would provide the freedom and choice to parents to be able to decide whether or not one of the parents wants to be able to stay home and to be able to provide that care to their child themselves. Or to be able to pay for childcare if that’s not an option and they need to return to work sooner than they expected. 

The second main thing that we need to do as a country is to expand the universal pre-K program. Right now this pre-K education and childhood development opportunity is not open and available to all Americans. I’d work with Congress and state and local governments and nonprofits to be able to expand that program for all Americans.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

There is still so much work that needs to be done to ensure accountability in the workplace, transparency, and true justice for survivors of sexual assault and those who have been dealing with sexual harassment.

We’ve seen unfortunately this norm perpetuated in the workplace and across our society where survivors of sexual assault are often bullied, and shamed, and treated with a terrible stigma that further worsens the pain and the hardship that they have gone through. We need real leadership to bring about a culture shift in our country, whether it’s in the private sector or the public sector. It’s why I’ve co-sponsored and supported legislation like the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/1585/text">Violence Against Women Reauthorization Act</a>, why I’m a co-sponsor of the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/5225/">POWER Act</a>, and have led the charge in the House of Representatives to fight against sexual assault in the military.

The <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1789">Military Justice Improvement Act</a> really seeks to bring about this culture shift in our military to make sure that there is transparency, that those who are survivors of sexual assault have someone to speak to, that they have an advocate who will work on their behalf. And that there is a clear path toward justice so the perpetrators of these crimes are held accountable. And so that every American can live without fear that they have to go to work every day in a place that is not safe for them. 

Women in the United States earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

Wage discrimination is the unfortunate reality that for so long hardworking Americans, especially women, across this country have been struggling with. This is the reality that unfortunately disproportionately negatively impacts women of color. 

This is something that we must correct in this country. Now, we’ve had laws that are supposed to uphold equal pay for equal work for a very long time, but sadly we see how that is not reflected in practical application.

This is one of the reasons why I’ve supported, as a member of Congress, the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/7/text">Paycheck Fairness Act</a> that institutes real layers of protection for those who are dealing with wage discrimination to hold their employers accountable and to correct it so that there is truly equal pay for equal work in this country.

As President I would sign the Paycheck Fairness Act into law because it provides workers with protection against employers who seek to retaliate against them for disclosing wage differences between themselves and others in their job who are doing the exact same work, but perhaps getting significantly higher pay for it. 

Workers have to have due process. And the ability to make sure that their voices are heard without risk of being retaliated against or losing their job—this is a simple act of fairness and making sure that there is accountability for those employers who choose not to abide by an equal pay for equal work law.

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not?

I think the federal government should not overstep its boundaries and start to dictate to corporations and corporate boards the demographics that have to be represented on those boards. 

However, there must be a concerted effort to encourage the professional development and opportunities of women who for so long and for so many reasons have been held back from those opportunities. This is something that we are seeing as necessary in the private sector, as well as in our government and the military. 

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work?

Discrimination against pregnant women in the workplace is still a very real problem. Even though the <a href="https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/statutes/pregnancy.cfm">Pregnancy Discrimination Act</a> was passed in 1978, unfortunately we have not seen enough protections in place to ensure that a woman does not feel like she has to make this choice between keeping her job and beginning a family.

This is why it’s important that we pass legislation like the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/2417">Pregnant Workers [Fairness Act]</a>. It’ll provide additional layers of protection for fairness, for women who are working and having to make these decisions that should not put at risk their choices and their family life or their choices at work.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Tulsi Gabbard

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The presidential campaign for Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) answered questions sent by Fortune and Time’s Up via email. The following transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave and, if so, what is your proposal to make it happen? 

Klobuchar campaign: Sen. Klobuchar supports providing paid sick days and paid family and medical leave at the federal level. The United States is the only industrialized nation without a national paid leave program, and only 19% of American workers have access to paid family leave through their employer. In the Senate, Sen. Klobuchar has been a strong supporter of Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand’s <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/463/">Family and Medical Insurance Leave (FAMILY) Act</a>. As President she will work with Congress to create a national paid family leave program to provide workers with 12 weeks of paid leave per year to care for a new child, a family member with a serious health condition, or their own serious health condition. The program would replace up to two-thirds of income and will include protections to maintain eligibility for part-time workers, people working at small businesses, and self-employed workers.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

Sen. Klobuchar believes that early, quality childcare and education is one of the most important public investments we can make as a country. In the Senate, Sen. Klobuchar has been a strong supporter of Sen. Patty Murray’s <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/568">Child Care for Working Families Act</a>. She also leads bipartisan legislation, the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/605">Child Care Workforce and Facilities Act</a>, to address the shortage of childcare providers by investing in workforce training and childcare facilities. As President, Sen. Klobuchar will work with Congress to make childcare more affordable by capping spending on childcare at 7% of income for families making up to 150% of their state’s median income through a new federal-state partnership. As part of the federal-state partnership, Sen. Klobuchar will require caregivers and early childhood teachers to be paid a living wage that is comparable to what elementary school teachers with similar credentials earn. She will also support access to quality preschool by working with states on programs for 3- and 4-year-olds from low- and moderate-income families. At the same time, Sen. Klobuchar will increase the matching rate for providers caring for infants and toddlers. In addition, she will work to increase the availability of childcare through competitive grants to states to support the training and retention of childcare workers and to building, renovating, or expanding childcare facilities in areas with childcare shortages. The grants will include incentives to provide childcare during nontraditional work hours and to allow childcare workers to obtain portable, stackable credentials to advance their careers.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment?  What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

Sexual harassment is not just about the cases of the rich and famous in the headlines, but also the line workers, the nurses, and the teachers. Sen. Klobuchar is deeply committed to doing more to ensure all Americans can work in workplaces free from harassment. In 2018, she successfully led major bipartisan legislation that changed the way harassment claims are handled in Congress. Now a victim can immediately pursue an administrative hearing or file a civil action, and members of Congress can be personally liable to pay for awards and settlements. During her time in the Senate, Sen. Klobuchar has advocated for Sen. Murray’s <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1082">BE HEARD in the Workplace Act</a>, which is a comprehensive approach to addressing workplace sexual harassment and assault by promoting transparency and accountability, strengthening legal remedies, and making sure all workers are protected. And she has pushed for additional legislation to address sexual harassment in the workplace such as Sen. Kamala Harris’s <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1067">Combating Sexual Harassment in Science Act</a> that addresses sexual harassment and gender harassment in STEM fields. As President, she will work with Congress to pass this important legislation and prioritize preventing and addressing sexual harassment in the workplace. 

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

Sen. Klobuchar believes this is wrong and that all Americans deserve equal pay for equal work. In the Senate, she is a co-sponsor of the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/270">Paycheck Fairness Act</a>, which ensures that employers pay women and men equally for equal work. As President, she will make passing this bill a priority, and she will take action to stop the Trump administration’s efforts to block rules that require large companies to disclose what they pay employees by sex, race, and ethnicity in an effort to prevent pay discrimination. Sen. Klobuchar also supports raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour, which will particularly help women and people of color, who are more likely to be in jobs paying less than that rate.  

Sen. Klobuchar supports better data collection to uncover pay discrimination and stronger penalities to hold employers accountable. As President, she will make passing the Paycheck Fairness Act a priority and direct federal agencies to aggressively enforce the law. Sen. Klobuchar supports provisions in the Paycheck Fairness Act that would require the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to collect data on compensation broken down by demographic categories and give the Department of Labor additional authority to investigate pay discrimination. It would also allow victims of pay discrimination to recover compensatory and punitive damages in addition to back pay. 

In addition, Sen. Klobuchar is committed to increasing economic opportunities for women. As cochair of the Diversify Tech Caucus and Women’s High Tech Coalition, Sen. Klobuchar has been a leader in expanding STEM education for women and underrepresented minorities. 

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

Sen. Klobuchar is open to considering requirements for corporate board memberships and other ways we can ensure full equality in the workplace. She has seen firsthand the positive impact of more women in the Senate and knows that all workplaces would benefit from more women and underrepresented groups in positions of leadership.

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work? 

Sen. Klobuchar is committed to improving workplace protections for pregnant women. As President, she will fully enforce laws like the <a href="https://www.eeoc.gov/laws/statutes/pregnancy.cfm">Pregnancy Discrimination Act</a>, which bans dicrimination on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions under the Civil Rights Act and work to pass the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/1101">Pregnant Workers Fairness Act</a>, which would clarify that employers are required to make reasonable accommodations for employees with pregnancy-related limitations on the job. In addition, she is committed to addressing racial disparities in maternal and infant mortality and addressing the shortage of maternity care health professionals in underserved rural and urban areas. As the top Democrat on the Rules Committee, Sen. Klobuchar led the effort to change the Senate rules to allow senators to bring their babies on the Senate floor.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Amy Klobuchar

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Former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick answered questions from Fortune and Time’s Up via email. The following transcript of that exchange has been edited for length and clarity. 

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave and, if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Patrick: As President, I would push for a federal mandatory paid family and medical leave program modeled on those already in place in some states like New York and Massachusetts.  Paid leave should include parental leave for birth or adoption as well as leave for illness or caring for a family member. The program will be universal and gender-neutral, providing up to 12 weeks of leave, in addition to the paid sick leave or vacation leave that all employers should also offer.   

It’s not enough to change our laws, however, if we do not change our culture as well. In a country where childcare still falls predominantly on women, we must make it the norm for both mothers and fathers to take time off so that women are not penalized in their careers for taking time off to have children. 

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

I would provide working families with support for affordable childcare in the form of a tax credit or direct contribution, so that they are no longer faced with the choice between caring for their children at home or providing for their families by joining the full-time workforce. We will pay for it by asking corporations and the wealthy to pay more, by raising rates, closing loopholes, and treating all income like income. 

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

Our businesses, our government, and our nation have failed to address the rampant sexual harassment and assault in our workplaces for far too long. As a result, not only are Americans at risk of harm, they are being denied the opportunity to prosper in safe and respectful workplaces.  

An astounding proportion of women have reported experiencing sexual harassment at work—an unconscionable fact that would be a top priority of my administration to address. We must commit to making every workplace in every corner of the country and every occupation free and safe from sexual harassment or assault for every individual who works there. And we must not rest until we do. 

I would work with Congress to pass legislation that protects against sexual harassment and assault through policies like prohibiting nondisclosure and non-disparagement clauses, limiting mandatory arbitration agreements, expanding anti-retaliation laws, and requiring more disclosure on existing claims and settlements. However, we must go beyond these legislative proposals to address the root causes of sexual harassment and assault, especially the power imbalance that exists at so many organizations from the shop floor to the boardroom.  

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

Men and women doing the same work should be paid the same. Period. This was the intent of the Equal Pay Act more than half a century ago, and this is the unfinished business we must take up. The gender pay gap hasn’t budged for 15 years, and we risk passing down this injustice to our children and our grandchildren. 

I would crack down on employers who discriminate based on gender and push for new rules and laws making it easier for women to determine whether they are being underpaid compared to their male colleagues. Employers will have to justify pay discrepancies where they arise. Employers will be prohibited from asking about pay history, which often locks women or other identity groups into a lifetime of lower pay. I would also require workplaces to make accommodations for women who are pregnant or breastfeeding, which is one of many barriers recent mothers face to succeeding in the workplace. And I would push for laws requiring pay gap data transparency from large employers.  

I would ensure that Americans of every identity have the same access to meaningful careers and capital to start new companies. My administration would increase penalties and enforcement for firms that violate fair employment and civil rights laws, all of which will be expanded to include sexual orientation and gender expression.

Until we know the pay disparities that may exist, we cannot work to correct them. Many companies are already doing equal pay audits themselves, and most companies have the data to do so. We should require employers to report this pay data so that we can finally, properly enforce the Equal Pay Act and ensure that no one is paid less because of their gender, race, sexual orientation, or any other aspect of their identity. 

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

Women and minorities are woefully underrepresented in our corporate world. I’ve spent much of my career fighting discrimination and ensuring fair employment practices at our largest corporations, including when I was appointed by a federal district court to lead Texaco’s Equality and Fairness Task Force after it was charged with discrimination in its workforce. 

I know, just as most Americans know, that diversity and inclusion make companies stronger, more creative, and, ultimately, more successful. We must fight discrimination and bias in all its forms and put policies like paid family leave and universal, affordable childcare in place that will ensure that all our corporate leaders—including but not limited to corporate boards—represent all of us. To the extent that even these efforts fall short, I am open to more direct ways to enforce representation, including requirements for women or other minorities on boards as some other countries are currently trying.

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work?

Research shows that the gender pay gap is oftentimes better described as the childbearing pay gap, as time off due to pregnancy, switching jobs after returning to the workforce, and discrimination related to being pregnant leads to lower lifetime earnings for mothers. In fact, researchers in other countries have found that this could explain up to 80% of the wage gap.  

I would require all workplaces to make accommodations for pregnant and breastfeeding women. But just as critically, I would ensure that mothers had the resources they needed—for example, through paid family and medical leave, childcare, and expanded child tax credits—to thrive. This should include programs that guarantee a living wage and flexible schedules from employers that are realistic for working families.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Deval Patrick

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The Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) campaign answered questions sent by Fortune and Time’s Up via email. The following transcript of that exchange has been edited for length and clarity. 

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave and, if so, what is your proposal to make it happen? 

Sanders campaign: Yes. Bernie believes we must guarantee paid family and medical leave, paid vacation, and paid sick days. When it comes to supporting real family values, the United States lags behind virtually every major country on earth. As President, Bernie will provide six months of paid family leave, provide families with paid sick time, paid vacation, and ensure survivors of domestic violence receive paid leave as well.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

The ages 0-4 are the most important years of human development. In America today, we have a dysfunctional childcare and pre-K system. It is unconscionable that in the wealthiest country in the world, we do not properly invest in our children’s healthy physical, social, educational, and cognitive development. We need a revolution in this country in terms of how we provide childcare and pre-K education. Bernie will guarantee universal childcare and prekindergarten to every child in America to help level the playing field, create new and good jobs, and enable parents more easily balance the demands of work and home.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

No. When Bernie is in the White House, he will do everything he can to protect workers from workplace harassment and discrimination. Bernie is a proud co-sponsor of and will sign into law the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1082">BE HEARD Act</a>, to expand and strengthen our anti-harrassment and discrimination laws and ensure individuals have access to justice.

This legislation will work to create harassment-free workplaces and crack down on companies that fail to address harassment and discrimination in the workplace. He will pass the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/788/all-info">Equality Act</a> to ensure LGBTQ+ individuals are protected from harassment. Bernie knows that one of the most important things we can do to stop workplace harassment and discrimination is to make it easier for workers to join unions to protect workers from exploitation and violations of labor laws. He will do just that by passing his Workplace Democracy plan and doubling union membership in this country. Bernie will undo Trump’s attack on the Equal Opportunity Commission. As President, Bernie will use executive authority to address sexual harassment. 

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

Fifty-six years ago, President Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act to prevent wage discrimination against women—a struggle we are still fighting in 2019. It is time to finally ensure pay equity for women workers. Equal pay for equal work isn't radical. It's basic justice. Bernie believes we must guarantee every worker pay equity for the same work, regardless of your gender, race, disability, sexual identity, or immigration status. Bernie believes it’s time for America to treat the lives of women, and in particular women of color, like they’re worth more than change on the dollar.

Bernie will ensure that there is equal pay for equal work through the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/270">Paycheck Fairness Act</a>, but it won’t stop there. He will enact paid family leave so we can stop forcing parents with a newborn baby back to work immediately after the birth because they lack paid family leave. Bernie will guarantee universal childcare and prekindergarten to every child in America to help level the playing field, create new and good jobs, and enable parents to more easily balance the demands of work and home. He will increase small-business lending to women to help them start their own businesses. He will ensure minimum wage workers, who are disproportionately adults and women of color, are guaranteed a job that pays a living wage of at least $15 an hour. This would result in a raise for the 53% of women working in minimum wage labor. Almost two-thirds of all student debt—nearly $929 billion as of 2019—in the U.S. is held by women. Bernie is going to cancel all of it and ensure that future generations can attend college tuition- and debt-free. He will make it easier for workers to join unions, ensuring women have union protections to address harassment and discrimination and to negotiate better wages.

Under Bernie’s <a href="https://berniesanders.com/issues/corporate-accountability-and-democracy/">Corporate Accountability and Democracy Plan</a>, we will require every corporation to complete an annual report that gives the compensation, gender, and racial composition of employees and board members. The Corporate Accountability and Democracy Plan will require all companies with more than $100 million in annual revenue to obtain a federal corporate charter that will enforce these requirements. 

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

Yes. Under Bernie’s Corporate Accountability and Democracy Plan, we will develop rules to diversify corporate boards by ensuring a significant portion of every board be composed of women and people from other historically underrepresented groups (e.g. marginalized by gender, race, ethnicity, religion, disability, or sexuality). And we will require every corporation to complete an annual report that gives the compensation, gender, and racial composition of the board and employees.

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protections for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work? 

Yes. We must end the discrimination against women in the workforce. No one should be denied a job, fired, passed over for promotion, or in any way discriminated against due to their pregnancy, and every workplace in America should make reasonable accommodations for their employees regarding pregnancy. When we are in office we will have a Department of Labor that is deeply committed to workers’ rights and to eliminating discrimination everywhere it exists in the workplace. 

We will also require employers provide at least six months of paid family leave to parents, and require paid medical leave and sick days so all workers who are pregnant can attend doctor appointments and pregnancy classes without risk of losing hours or wages.

Additionally, Bernie will establish federal protections against the firing of workers for any reason other than “just cause.” When Bernie is President he will fight to make sure workers cannot be fired “at will” and will sign a “just cause” law to protect workers and their constitutional right to speak out and organize in their workplaces.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Bernie Sanders

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Presidential candidate Tom Steyer joined Fortune for a video interview. The following transcript of that conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave and, if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Steyer: Our campaign stands for not just paid family leave, but specifically six months. We’re the only advanced country in the world that doesn’t have paid family leave, that doesn’t enable families to have both parents, if there are two parents, continue to be in the workforce. Our paid family leave is for both parents, because otherwise there’s an implicit assumption that women are the people who will be doing the childcare.

So how are we going to make that happen? That is something that is going to have to be passed; it’s got to be in my mind a federal policy. And it’s one that we’re very aggressive and very serious about as part of a suite of policies that support the idea that women specifically deserve equal pay. And that’s something that has got to be enforced, that there is paid family leave.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

We know that childcare costs on average something like $9,000 a year. And that is unaffordable for a lot of families. If we’re going to enable women to continue in their careers, then we’re going to have to subsidize that at the federal level. 

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

At our firm, we brought in lawyers 30 years ago to train everyone about sexual harassment. Maybe I was naive, I just didn’t think it existed in our firm. What I was worried about and what I was bringing people in to talk about and make sure we were sensitive to was what I would think of as creating an atmosphere, a threatening atmosphere for coworkers—along the lines of jokes or language or anything of that nature that would make people uncomfortable and make it a hostile atmosphere for people, specifically women, to work in.

So do I believe that corporate America has gone far enough on this? I don’t work in corporate America, but I can tell from reading the newspaper and from my past experience that I very much doubt they have. And that people have a right to work in a safe environment and not to be sexually harassed. 

American citizens who are women, is it OK for them to be subject to harassment and implicit threat? And the answer is it’s not OK. And it’s not within a country mile of OK. And therefore we have got to stand up for what’s right, and the government has to lay down the law and enforce that.

I believe, from what I can tell reading stories in the paper, that this is a continuing issue. There’s definitely a place for the federal government in this to put forward regulations and to insist they’re being obeyed.

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

There has to be a clear law that says equal pay for equal work. We need to make sure that there is open information between employees so that you can’t hide the fact of the pay gap within a corporation. We have to make sure that corporations don’t negotiate salaries based on previous salaries because that’s another place where discrimination, if it existed, continues. Information and openness is part of the answer to the pay gap, because once it’s obvious it ends.

There has been discrimination against women in terms of economic power almost from time immemorial. This is going to be part of a dramatic change in the relationship between the genders in the 21st century. As women get equal economic power, they actually will end up with equal power. And I think that’s why there’s been this discrimination. I’m not trying to justify it in any way, shape, or form. You ask me how, why do I think it happens, and it’s my belief that this is an attempt to enforce discrimination and to prevent women from achieving full equality and full power.

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

If you look at our campaign, our campaign manager is a woman, over our campaign staff is female, and over half our campaign staff are people of color. If you look at the business that I started 35 years ago, three of my four first partners were women. 

If I’m President I would insist on as much diversity as possible. Because I believe that’s who makes the best decisions, but also I think it’s more just. Do I believe that it should be mandated in American corporations? I haven’t gotten there yet. But I need to think about it more because I absolutely believe in the policy. I just don’t know if I’d go to a place where we put it into law and insisted that people do it. I know it’s the right thing to do.

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work?

There’s no question that there has been discrimination against women for the possibility that they’ll get pregnant. And then for the actual occurrence of pregnancy. And I think that that’s absolutely discriminatory. It’s unlawful. That is the kind of thing that I think has got to be carefully watched, has got to be supervised, and has got to be prosecuted if people are discriminated against.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Tom Steyer

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A White House spokesperson answered a select group of the questions sent by Fortune and Time’s Up via email. The following transcript of that exchange has been edited for length and clarity. In addition, President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign sent a statement, which we’ve printed in full.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave and, if so, what is your proposal to make it happen? 

White House spokesperson: Implementing paid family and medical leave for all Americans is a priority of the Trump administration. Just like a number of promises the President made during the campaign, he was recently able to deliver on <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/17/politics/ivanka-trump-federal-paid-family-leave/index.html">paid leave for all U.S. government employees</a>—a first and historic achievement. Under this administration, the country’s largest employer is setting an example that prioritizing families should be of utmost importance, and when they thrive, we all do.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

In December of last year, the President <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-white-house-summit-child-care-paid-leave/">spoke at a White House summit</a>, which included a large number of stakeholders, members of Congress, and others about this important issue. Adviser to the President Ivanka Trump has worked tirelessly over the last three years with members of the cabinet to hear from folks all over the country about what more the administration can do to ensure affordable childcare, and she spearheaded the <a href="https://www.appropriations.senate.gov/news/minority/summary_fy2019-labor-hhs-and-education-appropriations-bill-gains-subcommittee-approval">increased funding</a> for the Child Care and Development Block Grant to over $2 billion. Ivanka was also key in ensuring that we double the <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/president-donald-j-trumps-tax-cuts-helping-american-families-get-ahead/">child tax credit</a> in our historic tax cuts from $1,000 to $2,000 per family. Through these actions and from the thousands put back in the pockets of everyday Americans, the President is empowering working families across this country. 

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

This economy under President Trump has seen historically low unemployment and incredible wage growth across almost all demographics. <a href="https://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea10.htm">Female unemployment</a> has hit a 65-year low, while the <a href="https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t02.htm">unemployment rate for black Americans and Hispanic Americans</a> is at an all-time low. Paychecks are growing at the fastest pace in a decade, and twice as fast for low- and middle-income Americans. The results speak for themselves. 

President Trump’s reelection campaign responded to the Fortune/Time’s Up questions with the following statement: 

"President Trump has done more for working parents than any president in modern history. Thanks to President Trump, the unemployment rate has hit generational lows. Female unemployment has hit a 65-year low while the unemployment rate for black Americans and Hispanic Americans is at an all-time low. Paychecks are growing at the fastest pace in a decade, and twice as fast for low- and middle-income Americans. On paid family leave, President Trump made paid family leave a reality for 2.1 million federal employees as bipartisan legislation for all Americans advances. Moreover, President Trump was the first president in history to include paid family leave in his budget. As both a candidate and a nominee, President Trump advocated for paid family leave from the debate stage and on the campaign trail, and now he has taken concrete steps to make his vision a reality. On childcare, President Trump proposed increasing funding for the Child Care and Development Block Grant by over $2 billion, ensuring that working families have access to much-needed care. Additionally, by doubling the child tax credit, reskilling the American workforce, and putting thousands back into the average American family's paycheck through tax cuts and wage growth, President Trump has empowered working families across the country."

Neither the White House nor Trump’s reelection campaign responded to questions about pregnancy discrimination, legislation on the diversity of corporate boards, or sexual harassment.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Donald Trump

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Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) answered questions from Fortune and Time’s Up via email. The following transcript of that exchange has been edited for length and clarity. 

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave and, if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Warren: Yes, the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave. We are the only OECD country that fails to require any paid leave for new parents. Lack of paid leave squeezes families in a variety of ways. It results in lower earnings for those who must take unpaid leave to provide care. It deprives children and their parents of crucial bonding and recovery time after childbirth. And it can negatively affect caregivers’ ability to stay in the workforce and achieve higher earnings over time. 

My plan to enact paid family and medical leave builds on the plan originally proposed by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand. As President, I will fight for up to 12 weeks of paid family or medical leave in a one-year period to care for a newborn or newly adopted child; to act as caregiver to a spouse, child, parent, domestic partner, or chosen family member with a serious health condition; to deal with the worker’s own serious medical condition; or address specific military caregiving needs.  

Workers would receive 66% of their salary, capped at $4,000 per month, with a minimum payment of $580 per month. Unlike our current unpaid federal leave system, which is limited to businesses with over 50 employees, paid family and medical leave would be available to anyone who meets the work history requirements for Social Security Disability Insurance. This would be a game-changer for American families—and a big step toward building an economy that works for all of us.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

One of the first plans I released in my campaign was about providing universal childcare and high-quality childcare for every baby age 0-5 in our country. Childcare was the boulder that almost crushed me when I was a working mom with two little ones, but my Aunt Bee rescued us. Not everyone is lucky enough to have an Aunt Bee. Under my plan, high-quality childcare and early education will be free for millions of American families, and affordable for everyone. 

The federal government will partner with local providers—states, cities, school districts, nonprofits, tribes, faith-based organizations—to create a network of childcare options that would be available to every family. Local communities would be in charge, but providers would be held to high national standards to make sure that no matter where you live, your child will have access to quality care and early learning. Childcare and preschool workers will be doing the educational work that teachers do, so they will be paid like comparable public school teachers. The entire cost of my plan is covered by my wealth tax, a small tax on giant fortunes over $50 million. In the wealthiest country on the planet, affordable and high-quality childcare and early education should be a right for everyone, not a privilege reserved for the rich.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

We will only solve the problem of workplace sexual harassment when we achieve real accountability in every workplace and empower those who experience harassment to come forward, safely. That’s why I’ve sponsored the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1082">BE HEARD Act</a>, sweeping anti-harassment legislation that would strengthen protections against discrimination and make it easier for employees to report instances of harassment. I’ve also coauthored the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/2454/">Sunlight in Workplace Harassment Act</a>, a bill to force publicly traded companies to disclose workplace harassment and discrimination settlements while protecting the privacy of survivors. 

Within my own campaign, I’ve put in place anti-harassment and training policies to create a safe and inclusive organization that lives the values we fight for every day. 

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

Every year, we recognize Women’s Equal Pay Day in the spring. This day sounds like it should be a celebration, but it is a national day of embarrassment. We will recognize the next Equal Pay Day in the spring of 2020, because it will take the average woman one year and three months to make what the average man made over the course of just one year, from Jan. 1, 2019, to Jan. 1, 2020. We will recognize black, Latina, and Native American women’s Equal Pay Day even later in 2020 because the pay gap is much wider for women of color.

In the year 2020, we must make big structural change to close the pay gap once and for all. As President, I will take action on day one of my administration to boost wages for women of color throughout the federal government. The federal government can set a standard for higher wages that will influence the rest of the economy and lead us in the right direction toward closing the wage gap.

I will also pass the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/270">Paycheck Fairness Act</a>, a bill to amend the Equal Pay Act of 1963 to ensure that wage differences are the result of factors such as education, training, or experience, rather than gender. I'll also raise the minimum wage to $15 and make it easier to join a union. To increase pay for LGBTQ workers, I will pass the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/788/all-info">Equality Act</a> and fight for nondiscrimination protections in the workplace. 

The Paycheck Fairness Act includes penalties for employers who violate pay equity provisions.

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

Everyone deserves to have a seat at the table where decisions that impact their lives are made, but corporate boardrooms are overwhelmingly white and male. This shuts women and people of color out of the conversation and makes it more likely that biases will go unchecked in the decision-making process.

My <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/3348">Accountable Capitalism Act</a> would empower workers at big American corporations to elect no less than 40% of the company’s board members. This would diversify the pool of people making decisions at our nation’s biggest companies. I have also proposed a set of executive actions that will open up new pathways to the leadership positions women and women of color deserve. Companies with federal contracts employ roughly a quarter of the U.S. workforce—and I will deny contracting opportunities to companies with poor track records on diversity and equal pay. I will also issue an Equal Opportunity Executive Order to recruit and develop leadership paths for underrepresented workers. 

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work?

Growing up, I knew I wanted to be a public school teacher. I got my four-year degree from the University of Houston and went on to become a teacher for students with speech and learning disabilities. I got to live my dream. But when I became visibly pregnant, I was told that the job I'd been promised for next year would go to someone else. Pregnancy discrimination is real, and it still happens today. 

As President, I will strengthen protections for pregnant workers. I will fight to pass the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/1101">Pregnant Workers Fairness Act</a>, which, among other things, makes it illegal to fail to make reasonable accommodations for pregnant workers or to deny employment opportunities to pregnant workers based on the need to make such reasonable accommodations.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Elizabeth Warren

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Presidential candidate Andrew Yang joined Fortune for a video interview. The following transcript of that conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave and, if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Yang: Here’s the list of countries that do not have paid family leave for new mothers: The United States of America, Papua New Guinea. That’s the entire list. You know who got paid family leave for new moms in the last year? Swaziland, Lesotho, and Liberia. That’s how bad the United States is on this issue.

We need to pass paid family leave for new parents as soon as possible. Six months for any parent for you to take when your child is born. As President it will be my pleasure to sign paid family leave for all new parents to get us off that list and leave Papua New Guinea alone.

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

My wife, Evelyn, and I experienced this firsthand. We have two young boys who are 7 and 4; one of them has special needs. And it’s very hard for many families to access affordable and quality childcare around the country.

No one wants to put their kids in the situation where they’re not going to be taken care of in the right way. So we need to put more resources to work in our communities so that access to affordable childcare goes way up. There’s actually a desert of quality affordable childcare options in many, many parts of the country. This is a place where the federal government can help. We should put federal resources to work so that communities can actually make this childcare more accessible for all of us.

If it’s subsidized at a high enough level, which it should be, and will be under my administration, then you don’t have that conversation where one of the parents says they should stay at home because they’re not making enough to pay for childcare. 

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

Sexual harassment is still rampant in most of our large corporations and certainly in our government institutions. And one big way we can change this is by having transparency where you can’t have women negotiating away their ability to talk about what happened to them and their harassment. You can’t have legislators or CEOs burying these complaints and then saying, “Hey, we’ll give you some money but you have to stay quiet.” 

We run our organizations by this bottom-line mindset that makes everything revolve around the money. What happens then, is if you have bad actors who are making lots of money for their firm or their company, they can do no wrong. That ends up leading to cultures where if they harass women, then the natural inclination is just to sweep it under the rug rather than correct it. We have to have our organizations actually revolve around multiple interests and not just profits above all else.

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

First, we need to have equal pay for equal work at the government level. If you’re working in the government, then we can legislate that and make it happen. 

For companies, it’s harder just to legislate. One thing that would be a huge help is that oftentimes women don’t know how much they’re being underpaid relative to their male counterparts. So we need to have wage transparency where workers cannot be punished for sharing how much they’re being compensated with each other.

The most impactful thing we could do for women of color and women across the board would be to have a freedom dividend of $1,000 a month that goes to every single American. You’d have many more women entrepreneurs who are successfully able to start businesses. And they wouldn’t need to necessarily go to some male investor looking for the money because the revenue would be right there in the community.

If we put money into everyone’s hands, it starts to value the kind of work that my wife does with our boys, one of whom is autistic—the kind of work that women are doing every single day. 

When you think about the impact of technology on the workforce, you think about manufacturing, which was two-thirds men. But the reality is this next wave of automation is going to consume administrative and clerical and office jobs, the majority of which are women. The majority of retail jobs are filled by women, and retail is getting decimated by new technologies. In this era of historic change, putting a dividend of $1,000 a month into our hands is a necessary step. 

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

I think the fact that having one woman on a corporate board is a problem for companies—it just shows how absurdly imbalanced the board environment is. Having a requirement that at least one woman is on the board of directors or the executive board, and as a proportion of the number of board members, would just help these organizations operate more equitably and efficiently.

Other countries have seen that. If you are a responsible organization, you should have women on your board anyway, so having a rule in place shouldn’t make a difference to you.

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work?

We need to protect pregnant women in the workplace. I feel very passionately about this because my wife, Evelyn, [breastfed and] pumped for many months, and I saw just how arduous that was and how you had to schedule it consistently. Doing it in a work environment you need to have accommodations, you need private spaces for women to be able to pump as needed. And this should be built into any modern company at this point. I would love to be able to regulate to protect any pregnant woman from some sort of discrimination in the workforce.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Andrew Yang

2020 candidates

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Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) joined Fortune for a video interview before he ended his presidential campaign on Jan. 13. The following transcript of that conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave, and if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Booker: I believe the United States should have mandatory paid family and medical leave. In fact, we are an outlier in industrial nations. It’s outrageous that we are the only one without paid family leave. 

I support a number of proposals in the Senate to do it, but if I’m President of the United States, I’m going to drive this to completion. And I believe that we can do family leave in the same way we do Social Security—by having the employer and employee paying into a fund to make sure it is something that is available for everyone. This is not something that will hurt the economy—it’ll actually make our economy stronger and empower families to be able to succeed. 

How will you ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

It is outrageous in the United States that we have, in the majority of our states, childcare more expensive than tuition at a state college. This is unacceptable, and especially when you add to that that people who actually work in childcare are often very much underpaid. And so I believe that no one should pay more than 7% of their income in their childcare costs. 

I also believe that people who are making about 75% of median income where they live should have free childcare. I have legislation to do just that as a United States senator. If I am President of the United States, we are going to pass that legislation so we can join the ranks of competitive industrial nations making sure that childcare is affordable. 

This is part of the larger vision of our country, that children in our nation, from the womb until they get to public schools and beyond, have a nurturing environment to thrive in and succeed. Because they are indeed our nation’s most valuable natural resource.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to ensure that work is safe, fair, and dignified for women of all kinds?

We have a lot more to do in this nation to make sure that we are dealing with the crisis in our country of sexual harassment. It exists all through our economy, all throughout our nation. And we have to be far more aggressive in dealing with it. I’m fighting already as a United States senator to make sure that the loopholes in federal law are closed in an act called the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1082">BE HEARD Act</a>. And I’m going to fight to make sure that we get that done, both as a senator and as President of the United States.

We need to stop the kind of things that allow sexual harassment to proliferate. We need to make sure that service-sector employees are not vulnerable to them. We need to make sure that workplace harassment is thoroughly investigated and people are held accountable. We need to make sure that folks who are in areas of our economy that are often overlooked—whether it’s people who are immigrants to our country, or contract workers—that we have a system where every person is free from work environments where sexual harassment can be rife. 

Women in the United States earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

We have a real pay gap problem between women and white men, and it’s even more dramatic for women of color. And this is something that is tantamount to theft, and means that you see many women having to work significantly longer just to have that kind of pay equity. That’s just unacceptable in the United States of America. I’m already taking action as a United States senator to correct this. If I’m President of the United States, I’m going to demand better reporting requirements so that we can hold people accountable. I believe that we should have a Department of Justice that’s investigating these kinds of pay disparities and the discrimination that is inherent in that.

I believe that we can do things more through legislation to demand, not just reporting, but other levels of accountability. This is a real issue in the United States that is not just affecting women, it’s affecting children and families, and it is patently hurting this country. It's about time we be who we say we are, a nation which is really is about equality, not just in words but definitely in pay as well.

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why, or why not?

I support this idea that we must have corporate boards that are reflective of the diversity of this nation. And when it comes to gender equity, this is an issue that we have to be willing to demand. And I know that I could do that as President of the United States by talking about—even if you were going to be bidding on contracts, part of the disclosure that we’re going to look for is, what is the makeup of your corporate board?

I think that we should create more and more levels of accountability. It’s something that I fought for when I got to the United States Senate and saw that Senate staffs didn’t have gender diversity—talk about the board of our nation in terms of the diversity of people who are making decisions about how our country as a whole work.

One of the ways we work to correct that with the Senate leader in the Democratic Caucus was by asking [Minority Leader] Chuck Schumer to make every single senator disclose how many women and minorities they had on their staff. That kind of scrutiny, that kind of transparency helped to see changes being made in the Senate and has helped to address diversity issues. We can do that in the corporate world as well. I will make sure that diversity is not something we [only] talk about or not something that is just a sentiment. We know diverse teams are better teams. We will make America stronger by working to make diversity on corporate boards a reality.

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant, or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work?

We need to make sure we have strong laws protecting against discrimination for women who are pregnant. People who are pregnant face discrimination in the workforce routinely, and I think we can strengthen both the letter of the law and prevent there being loopholes. We can set an example in how we do it with government and government contractors. And I think that we can actually do a better job of investigating and enforcing through the Department of Labor as well as the Department of Justice.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Cory Booker

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Montana Gov. Steve Bullock joined Fortune for a video interview before he ended his Presidential campaign on Dec. 2. The following transcript of that conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have mandatory paid family and medical leave? And if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Bullock: I do believe that the United States of America should have paid mandatory family and medical leave, and have actually come out supporting the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/1185">FAMILY Act</a>, which would provide about 12 weeks of leave, not only for the caregiving of a child but also as more and more of us become caregivers with our parents and others.  

About a quarter of women in this country actually have to be back to work within 10 days of giving birth. Increasing the opportunities for family leave not only will help the family, also it’ll reduce child mortality along the way. As an industrialized nation that actually takes care of its people, it should be a national program, and it’s time that we do that now.

In Montana, I supported legislation along the way. And I think all across this country you’ve seen those actions. There are good bills introduced in Congress right now. [We need] the recognition that this shouldn’t be a political issue. 

What will you do to ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

As I fought for a universal pre-K program in my state, it was amazing how many folks were saying, “I actually have to choose between working and a quality program.” Knowing that even a universal or quality preschool program can cost more than college tuition, families shouldn’t be making that choice. 

I think a number of steps should be taken. First, we have to guarantee a quality pre-K program for everyone in this country, and that money should be coming from the federal government. It’s more than just the opportunity to ensure that we have family members than can stay in the workforce. We know that 90% of a child’s brain is developed even before they enter into kindergarten, and if you’re not kindergarten-ready you’re four times more likely to drop out of high school if, at the end of the day, you haven’t caught up by third grade.

If we’re really talking about what we can do for that next generation, quality pre-K is part of it. But it has to be more than just [ages] 4 and 5. Because even a quality day-care program can have significant costs. There are existing federal programs that help subsidize those, but that’s another area where we should be making greater federal investments so nobody’s choosing between either having to drop out of the workforce or have their kids in less than an enriching program.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

I don’t think everywhere from Congress to Fortune 500 companies have done enough to address sexual harassment in the workplace. Look, on the one hand right we have Title VII, we have the Civil Rights Act. 

This is one where laws aren’t going to solve all of it. But what we’ve seen over the last handful of years is that courageous women have stood up and said no one should have to expect harassment in the workplace. It’s really changed our overall national conversation about this. I think the laws should always work, and as President would certainly work at the federal level both to protect women in the federal workplace and strengthen whistleblower laws.

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

As governor, when I first came in, I formed an equal pay for equal work commission. The notion that it’s over 50 years since the Equal Pay Act was first passed at the federal level, and we still are in a situation where women are making on average 80 cents on the dollar to men for doing the same work—or if you’re a woman of color about 60 cents on the dollar. There are some things that you can take even beyond the legislative domain, like encouraging companies and government—like I did with state government—to do pay audits. 

We should actually pass the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/270">Paycheck Fairness Act</a> so at the end of the day if someone’s trying to find out what other people at the workplace are getting paid, they won’t be punished. We need to be encouraging individual companies to stop asking that question about salary history during interviews. One of the things that I did in Montana is actually highlighting all the companies who would take an equal pay pledge, that would actually sign up for notions of transparency, doing the pay audits, ensuring that we’re making a more equitable workplace.

So the leadership can come both from the government, but also from the private sector. Because there are a lot of companies that are doing good work.

Whether every company should have to—private and public—report exactly what the wages are for their individuals, I don’t think that I would go that far at this point. But anything we can do to add that transparency and sunshine, I think at the end of the day will help eliminate the pay gap.

It was the Kennedy days when we said we were going to solve this. And 60 years later, that we’re still in this position demonstrates that while strides have been made, there’s still a lot more to do.

Do you support policies that require corporations to have women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

As governor of Montana, I appoint people to everything from education boards to boards of plumbing and outfitters. From that perspective, I always find that the diversity of the conversation is better with diverse boards.

You’ve seen California as an example. The California model is significant because it’s at least an assurance of one voice. I don’t think we can legislate all of this through. [We should also] hold up those examples where boards of directors and senior management reflect the diversity of the workforce. 

Would you—and how would you—propose to strengthen protection for people who need accommodations to do their jobs while pregnant or who are discriminated against because of their pregnancies at work? 

We have sort of the overall legal frame that anybody should get accommodations to do their job under the [Americans With Disabilities Act]. But [we should recognize] that there are different challenges, certainly in the workforce, for women who are pregnant. We really do have to take a look at what the jobs are and how we can make accommodations. No woman should have to leave a job because for that time of pregnancy she can’t actually perform that same position that she may have held along the way.

We need to look at where we’ve fallen short at the federal level and try to make sure that everybody shouldn’t have to be thinking about leaving her place of employment just because of pregnancy, and that accommodations are made so that she can still contribute to that company while at the same time being safe along the way.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Steve Bullock

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Former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julián Castro joined Fortune for a video interview before he ended his presidential campaign on Jan. 2; he has since endorsed Sen. Elizabeth Warren. The following transcript of that conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe the United States should have mandatory paid family leave and medical leave? And if so, how would you make that happen?

Castro: I believe the United States should join other countries around the world that offer paid family and medical leave for all families. I support at least 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave. I would work with Congress to fund that and look at different ways that we can fund it, including raising the caps on the payroll tax and even looking at an additional payroll tax.

I also believe that one of the things we need to do is to catch up to how families live today. We have a lot of grandparents raising their grandchildren as their own children. We have a lot of aunts and uncles in our communities out there that are raising their nieces and nephews. We need to recognize the importance of our families, and also recognize that our notion of family when we make laws is too often stuck in the past. I think about the LGBTQ community, for instance. We need to catch up with how families live today. And absolutely at least provide 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave.

What will you do to ensure that families who need it have access to safe, affordable childcare?

One year of childcare can cost as much as a year of college in some places. And I want to make sure that every single child, every single family has the opportunity to avail themselves of good childcare. That’s why I’ve proposed in my Working Families Plan that we invest in universal childcare, where the most that anybody would pay would be 7% of their income. It would help ensure that no matter your resources, you’re able to actually avail yourself of good childcare for your children. I think that would not only be a tremendous opportunity for families—it would also help companies. It would make employees more productive and allow a lot of people who are not able to go into work today to be able to go in to work. It would help our workforce. So we get a double win there.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

There’s no question that most institutions have been completely behind the times when it comes to addressing sexual harassment in just about every way in terms of their written policies, and maybe most importantly, how seriously a lot of organizations have actually taken complaints about sexual harassment and even sexual assault. And the fact that oftentimes there’s a culture in a lot of places of employment where people are afraid to come forward and to bring a complaint because they’re concerned about the repercussions to their career. And one of the great things about the #MeToo movement is that it is slowly but surely changing that. 

What’s important, though, is that we have to ensure that there’s legislation, that we make investments in opportunity for everyone. And also that companies change their policies and change their culture so that sexual harassment does not happen as frequently as it does today. And that if it does happen, that somebody who has been sexually harassed feels comfortable bringing that forward. And that there are consequences and accountability for people who engage in sexual harassment—for so long there has not been the right kind of accountability.

At the local government level, state government level, or federally, when we award government contracts, I believe that we should take a look at things like how is a company doing in terms of its policies related to sexual harassment to ensure that there is parity in the workplace for men and women.

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

We absolutely need to close the pay gap and close the opportunity gap for women. I grew up watching my mother work very hard as a single mom to provide for me and my brother. So many women work hard out there, just as hard or harder than men do, but don’t get paid the same amount for that same work. That shouldn’t be the case in the United States. 

We need to use both a carrot and a stick approach with our public sector and our private sector to pass legislation that will further address that gap, to use the power of the federal government in contracting, for instance, to scrutinize whether companies are living up to that parity. And also, in law to find ways to hold companies that are not living up to that parity accountable so that they move toward closing that pay gap. I would also ensure that we invest in opportunity for women and girls from the ground up.

I have a daughter Carina who is 10 years old, and I want to make sure that she can reach her dreams just like my son Christian. Oftentimes still in our education system, girls are at a disadvantage compared to boys. We have to be very intentional about ensuring that all the way through as they grow up that our girls are able to avail themselves of the same opportunity to get the same kind of education to reach for their dreams just like boys are.

The biggest benefit to closing that pay gap is justice, because I believe that if somebody’s doing the same work that they should get the same pay, no matter who they are. But there’s also of course a benefit to families; you have a lot of families that are being shortchanged right now because a woman is working just as hard as men do but she’s not getting paid what she should. There’s also an overall benefit to our economy. Study after study has shown that if we close that gender pay gap, we’re all going to benefit with a stronger economy.

Do you support legislation requiring companies to include women and other underrepresented groups on corporate boards? Why or why not? 

I believe that the government should get involved in ensuring greater diversity and greater gender parity in terms of corporate boards, particularly for [public companies], and find ways to incentivize private companies to pursue gender parity.

Today, corporations are not doing nearly enough when you look at the statistics of who sits on these boards. I absolutely believe that they’ve had enough time to make the changes. They haven’t made those changes—it’s been very slow going. So I see a role for the federal government in a constructive way to ensure that we close that gap.

Of course it would be a tough fight to get that done. For different reasons—some people still hold old ideas; some folks are reluctant to change. But also of course you have people that very much believe in allowing the private sector to do what the private sector’s going to do.

I believe that we should have a robust private sector in our country, but I also believe that the federal government and state and local governments have a role to play in ensuring that everybody in this country has opportunity and everybody can prosper. Sometimes you need a little bit of steering and making sure that we’re closing that gender pay gap and representation on corporate boards and improving the policies that these corporations have. I believe that that’s within the wheelhouse of the federal government in the right way.

Would you—and how would you—propose strengthening protections for people who need accommodations to do their job while they’re pregnant? Or who are discriminated against because they’re pregnant while they’re at work? 

We have a lot of folks in the workforce who are committed to their career—and they also want to start a family. We need companies that are going to be supportive of that, including making sure that accommodations exist in the workforce for them.

[That’s] expanding our laws that have dealt with ensuring that women are treated equally in the workplace. Laws that deal with accommodations that should be made, like in a different context for people who may have a disability. In the same vein, I think that we should shape our laws to protect people when they’re going through pregnancy so that they’re able, if they want to, to be able to work and to be comfortable as they do that.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Julián Castro

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Former presidential candidate Marianne Williamson joined Fortune for a video interview before she ended her campaign on Jan. 10. The following transcript of that conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Fortune/Time’s Up: Do you believe that the United States should have comprehensive paid family and medical leave and, if so, what is your proposal to make it happen?

Williamson: We absolutely should have paid family leave. It should be at least three months—I wouldn’t have a problem with it going all the way to six months. And we could have a very, very tiny tax, something like two cents on every dollar, that would pay for at least 66% of people’s salary.

I think it’s very important that we ask ourselves as a society, both why we need paid family leave and why we don’t have it now. We need it because when a woman has to leave her child too quickly after giving birth, millions of years of evolution have gone into that woman knowing my baby still needs me. This is something that a woman’s cells feel. 

When you allow fathers and mothers more time with children after the children are born, if you give that first six months to everything necessary for the deepest level of bonding between parents and children, there will be so much less societal dysfunction years later. What we have done is to allow very superficial business dictates—oh, we can’t afford that—to block the betterment of our society through the betterment of human beings. 

How would you ensure that families have access to safe, affordable childcare? 

When my daughter was born, because I am a writer and because I was a teacher, I realized that I had luxuries that other women don’t have because my workplace was none other than my home.

We should ask ourselves, what kind of a society do we want? The society that we want, I believe, is one in which it is mandated at large companies that childcare is present on the premises. We need to integrate our children into our lives more, into our society.

We’re having all this terrible dysfunction and chronic trauma among children because so many of them are not getting as much nurturing as they need. And that’s because we’ve developed a society in which those kinds of human needs are given short shrift. I’d like to see businesses have not only childcare on site, but real childcare, not just somebody who’s watching the kids. There should be culture, there should be art, there should be educational projects. What I’d like to see for women is just like you have it mandated that you have to have a lunch break, it should be mandated that sometime before lunch the woman can spend 30 minutes down in the childcare room with the kids, and 30 minutes later in the day as well. 

The very fact that this seems like radical or out there shows what trouble we’re in. Why is it that we’re serving an economic system rather than remembering that the whole point of an economic system is to serve humanity?

Children should not just be tolerated. A mother having access to time spent with her children should not just be permitted, it should be invited, it should be embraced. And that’s how business should operate.

Do you think institutions—from Congress to Fortune 500 companies—have done enough to address sexual harassment? What have you done, and what will you do, to prevent and address sexual harassment in the workplace?

We definitely have not done enough to address sexual harassment in the workplace. But one of the things we need to do is to ask ourselves what is happening in our society that sexual harassment is such an issue for women anyway? 

Just like when you have signs in certain businesses where it is actually legally mandated that people know their rights in terms of worker’s compensation, we should have it legally mandated that every woman and every man knows what’s expected in this business and what is legal in this business.

Too many people don’t even know what constitutes sexual harassment. In large companies, there should be a training that everybody in the business goes through, whether it’s once a month or every three months. That is the only way for women to feel free. That is the only way for women to feel that we can relax in the workplace.

Women in the U.S. earn 80 cents on white men’s dollar in wages, a gap that gets even wider for black women, Latinas, and Native American women. What is your plan to work with employers to close the pay and opportunity gap for women, including women of color, LGBTQ women, and working mothers?

One of the most important things we need to do is to pass the ERA [Equal Rights Amendment]. But this needs to stop—this idea of a pay gap between men and women needs to stop. The pay gap between blacks and whites needs to stop. This is once again something where we as a society need to take a stand. 

A woman, when she makes less money, this has long-term repercussions on the Social Security that she gets later in life. One of the crises that we have is among older women who do, on average, receive far less Social Security. We have a problem here with so many women who are forced to work part-time in order to take care of their children—then they get less in terms of benefits. All of these deeper issues have to do with the fact that ultimately more and more of the burden of life, the economic burden, the social burden, is put onto the shoulders of those who make less money, onto women, onto people of color, and ultimately onto our children.

Do you support legislation requiring companies to appoint women and underrepresented groups to corporate boards? Why or why not? 

We are living at a time where I think a lot of people within corporate America know that American capitalism in too many ways has lost its soul. American capitalism has lost its conscience. And there is a great correction going on right now. I admire corporate leaders who are voicing this. But we need to step it up. We need to go faster and we need to not ask for too little. There should be diversity, there should be more women on corporate boards, and there should be more workers on corporate boards.

But the thing is, not just for cosmetic purposes. The fact that it’s a woman on the board doesn’t in and of itself really change things fundamentally. That’s why I think these conversations are important. It’s important that we have these conversations that allow for a greater space of possibility once the woman gets on the board. If she gets on the board, but she’s expected basically to be little more than a good girl once she gets there, it just goes along with how things already are. But it begins with at least her being at the table. The second thing is that she has permission to say what she really thinks.

Would you—and how would you—propose strengthening protections for people who need accommodations to do their job while they’re pregnant? Or who are discriminated against because they’re pregnant while they’re at work? 

It's beginning to change—we’re beginning to have more and more of a welcoming attitude toward pregnant women, toward new mothers. But we need to have more, and more of that’s legally mandated.

This project was published on Jan. 28, 2020.

Marianne Williamson

Former candidates

Fortune partnered with Time’s Up to talk to the 2020 presidential candidates about their policy positions on issues like paid family leave, sexual harassment, and pregnancy discrimination.

Fortune + Time's Up ask the candidates about the issues that matter to working women

2020 candidates

Former candidates