It’s been over 50 years since the Equal Pay Act was passed, yet women are still making less, on average, than their male counterparts. In his State of the Union Address last month, President Obama reiterated the statistic that working women in the U.S. “make 77 cents for every dollar a man earns.” What’s even more appalling is this number has remained stagnant for the last 15 years despite the fact that women account for slightly less than half (47 percent) of the labor workforce in the U.S. We’ve been told the Paycheck Fairness Act will help close the pay gap, but earlier this morning I read about a different solution.

Lydia Dishman of FastCompany proposed a new strategy to help eliminate the gender pay gap: transparency.

Dishman reports on social sharing startup Buffer, and how its radical approach to transparency has removed the gender pay gap within the company. Transparency ensures female staff are paid as much as their male counterparts, but it goes beyond that. According to Buffer’s Co-Founder and COO Leo Widrich, “this isn’t even a discussion point — it’s not on the agenda to talk about whether women or men should be paid the same. That’s true equality I believe,” Widrich said to FastCompany. Buffer is so confident in its approach that it published its formula, which starts with a base amount for the position then adds a set amount for seniority, experience and location.

Another company mentioned in the FastCompany article is software startup Figure53, which instituted a flat-pay structure. While this does eliminate the gender pay gap, it doesn’t come without its issues, such as adjusting pay for cost of living in different cities or recognizing different levels of responsibility.

“Salary transparency and equity are one of the many things that we do here that make Figure3 feel like an inclusive and welcoming work environment,” Lola Pierson, a community manager for Figure53, told FastCompany. “Because we have equal salaries, we aren’t in a situation where the women in the office happen to make less, but we can point to another reason and say that it’s fair because it’s based in the expectations of the market.”

What are you thoughts on salary transparency? Let us know by posting a comment below.