WASHINGTON, Sept. 18 (UPI) -- Pay equity has recently emerged as a campaign issue in the U.S. presidential race, observers say.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported Thursday that Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois has aired an ad about women not making as much as men doing similar jobs.
The ads ran in battleground states, including Pennsylvania, the newspaper reported.
Obama is criticizing McCain for opposing a Senate bill that would overturn a Supreme Court decision that makes it more difficult for women to sue for pay discrimination.
Anna Greenberg of Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, a Washington polling and research firm, said the issue of pay equity is important to female voters.
"Pay equity has tested very well with unmarried women," Greenberg said. "Of course you have to explain
it simply, as equal pay for equal work, and it has to be framed as part of a larger attack on John McCain's economic policies and how they negatively impact women."
For his part, McCain has said the proposal to extend the statute of limitations on when pay equity lawsuits can be filed would lead to a legal morass.
