This is a guest post that is part of a series featuring women leaders for Black Women’s Equal Pay Day, which falls on August 7, 2018.

New York City Council Member Debi Rose

This is a painful topic, and deeply personal. By both race and gender, a higher percentage of black women (9.7 percent) are enrolled in college than any other group, topping Asian women (8.7 percent), white women (7.1 percent) and white men (6.1 percent). And yet, it takes over eight months for an African-American woman to earn equal pay to a similarly qualified white male! To be equally educated, equally qualified, but unequally paid, is not only heartbreaking, but infuriating. Not only are we the minority, stigmatized daily for the decisions we make in every aspect of our lives, but we have to also face issues of financial insecurity based on our race and gender. African-American women are the backbones of our communities and can no longer countenance being treated as second class citizens. This is important to me because the fight for equal pay becomes more important as the years go on. This inequity must end, and it must end now – not next week, not next month, not next year, but now!!