This year, actress Patricia Arquette, in accepting her Best Supporting Actress statue for the film Boyhood, used her stage time to advocate for equal pay for women – not just in Hollywood, but in every workplace.
Arquette used the recent hack into Sony studio computers, which revealed what various performers were being paid for certain film roles, as a jumping-off point to make her case for equal pay for women in all professions.
This may have been news in show business, but not in most places of business. Census data released in 2014 indicate that full-time working women still earn 78 cents on the dollar compared to their male counterparts, on average. For black and Latina women, the ratio is even worse: 64 cents and 54 cents, respectively, compared to white men doing comparable work.
While the actress was expressing her personal beliefs, her message resonated with the audience loud and clear.