If there is one issue that marked this legislative session in a way that no other one issue has, it was the full court attacks led by Pres. Donald Trump, GOP state Rep. Laurel Libby, and all the MAGA acolytes trying to reverse civil rights protections for trans children and adults
Fully eight bills were submitted seeking to do harm to trans Mainers and their families. From kicking trans girls off of athletic teams, to forcing high school students to use bathrooms with those of another gender, to requiring administrators, teachers, and fellow students to bully trans boys by calling them “she”.
It was not just children they went after, it was any trans person looking for housing, a job, or trying to secure a loan. One bill attempted to strike Maine’s 2005 groundbreaking gender identity protections, inserted into the Maine human rights act by voters.
Which brings me to the point of this column — an aspect often overlooked in this debate. Rolling back trans rights is not only a civil rights issue about societal rejection, it is about deepening the income inequality for some of our lowest income Mainers.
Due to rampant discrimination and ostracization around the country, transgender adults are already much more likely to have lower incomes than others in our communities. The GOP efforts to allow financial discrimination against trans people in Maine would have hurt them even more.
Education attainment data, one of the most important indicators of economic security according to CDC statistics, shows that trans women are much less likely to complete high school or get a college degree than cis-women. From bullying that forces young people to drop out before the 12th grade, to college students being cut off from parents as they begin transitioning, this discrimination severely limits a person’s ability to get the education needed to support a family in a healthy, economically stable, manner.
While lack of education can be crushing to long term economic stability, health care for the trans community can be financially unbearable before one even gets started in life. Hormone therapy, mental health treatment, and surgery — to name just a few of the basic needs denied the trans community — are often cost prohibitive without going into serious debt. In a world where health care providers and insurance companies are given the green light to discriminate, many trans individuals rack up thousands of dollars in debt very early in life simply trying to get the healthcare they need to survive.
Last, but certainly not least, trans Americans are unemployed at a rate which is three times the US unemployment rate. And then, even when a trans woman is able to get a job, she is paid 60 cents on the dollar that the average worker earns.
Check out this graphic from the HRC Foundation based on a study they did of nearly 7,000 LGBTQ+ workers in America.
All of this helps explain why data shows that almost one in three trans adults live in poverty, compared to 16% for the general population. All because of bigotry and discrimination, compounded by a fear of being fired in most states, if one attempts to advocate for better wages and internal promotions.
So, while the session was marked by the attacks of bigots – and by the courage Democrats had in defeating every attempted rollback – we should all be supporting trans rights not simply because bigotry is wrong, but because supporting trans rights is also an important piece of helping reduce income inequality in Maine and in America.
