A New Force for America’s Families
Posted by Michelle Moquin on January 18th, 2014
Good morning!
A New Force for America’s Families
Women of Color Strongly Support Workplace Changes and Policies to Address Economic Hardship
In order to better understand public attitudes and beliefs about women and the economy, A Woman’s Nation Foundation, in conjunction with the Center for American Progress and AARP, commissioned a large national survey of 3,500 Americans to accompany the 2014 edition of The Shriver Report: A Woman’s Nation Pushes Back from the Brink. The bipartisan poll was designed and conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research and TargetPoint Consulting and includes significant oversamples of African Americans and Latinos allowing us to look deeper into the attitudes of these important groups of women, as well as make comparisons across these groups.
Overall, our poll finds that African American and Latina women are among the strongest supporters of new steps by employers and governments to help women better adapt to changing family and workplace structures. Facing more difficult economic realities than many other Americans, women of color overwhelmingly desire increased economic opportunities, more flexibility at work, and back legal changes to ensure that women and workers are able to contribute fully to their families and to the national economy.
The overall survey results are described in detail in the full report. The most important findings from the African American and Latino oversamples include:
Women of color face more serious economic challenges than do white women but express greater optimism about their own futures. The overall economic situation for women of color is quite difficult. Forty-three percent of African American women and 45 percent of Latina women report annual family incomes of less than $40,000 per year, compared to about 3 in 10 white women, or 31 percent. Although women in general are more likely to live in two-income households than in one-income ones—47 percent of women live in two-income households, while 31 percent live in one-income households, with the remainder either retired or otherwise not employed—women of color are far more likely than white women to say that they could not get by without two-incomes: 57 percent of African American women and 59 percent of Latina women say this, compared to 45 percent of white women. Forty-two percent of African American women and 39 percent of Latina women also believe that the statement, “The harder I work, the more I fall behind,” describes them well, compared to only 30 percent of white women and 28 percent of Americans overall. Similarly, African American women are more than twice as likely as white women to report being unsatisfied with their jobs—22 percent versus 9 percent, respectively.
Reflecting the difficult economic prospects facing many women of color, majorities of both African American and Latina women—55 percent and 53 percent, respectively—report having received some form of government benefits in the past year including nutrition assistance, unemployment benefits, Medicaid, state children’s health insurance benefits, or reduced-price school lunches. In contrast, only 19 percent of white women report having received government assistance.
Despite these differences in more objective economic pressures, women of color express greater optimism about their own situations and experience less stress than do white women. For example, 83 percent of African American women and 74 percent of Latina women expect that their financial situation will get better over the next five years compared to only 52 percent of white women. More than 6 in 10 African American women—67 percent—and Latina women—62 percent—say that the statement, “I believe I have the ability to make significant changes in my life to make my life better,” describes them well, compared to only 47 percent of white women. Perhaps as a result of this increased confidence about the future, women of color report lower levels of stress than do white women. A full 50 percent of white women say they are stressed these days compared to majorities of African American women and Latina women that report not feeling that stressed. Fifty-eight percent of each group, respectively, report stress levels below neutral on a 0-to-10 scale.
Women of color overwhelmingly want society to adapt to the realities of contemporary family structures. Nearly 9 in 10 African American women—87 percent—and more than three quarters of Latina women—76 percent—agree with the statement, “Government should set a goal of helping society adapt to the reality of single-parent families and use its resources to help children and mothers succeed regardless of their family status.” Although agreement with this concept is strong across groups—64 percent among Americans overall and 62 percent among white women—women of color show the strongest preferences for government policies designed to help today’s families as they actually exist. Latina women, however, appear more conflicted than other women about how best to deal with these family changes. Sixty-seven percent of Latina women also agree that, “Government should set a goal of reducing the number of children born to single parents and use its resources to encourage marriage and two-parent families,” compared to only 45 percent of African American women and 47 percent of white women.
Women of color are more likely than white women to express regrets about their own decisions regarding family, work, and education. The poll asked respondents whether they had any regrets about a range of decisions in life and whether they would choose to do things differently if they had the chance. In general, African American and Latina women are more likely than white women to say that they would have delayed family decisions around marriage and kids and focused more on their own education and career choices. Forty percent of married or divorced African American women and 46 percent of Latina women would have “delayed getting married” compared to 32 percent of white women. Likewise, 34 percent of African American women and 46 percent of Latina women would have “delayed having kids or had fewer kids” if they could do it all over again compared to only 20 percent of white women. Fifty-five percent of African women and 49 percent of Latina women say they should have “gotten out of a bad relationship” sooner, compared to 37 percent of white women. Interestingly, African American men express similar attitudes with 51 percent of black men saying they should have delayed marriage and 33 percent saying that they should have delayed having kids or had fewer kids.
What would these women have done instead? Sixty-eight percent of African American women and 75 percent of Latina women say that they should have “put a higher priority on [their] education and career”; 53 percent of white women say the same. Roughly similar proportions of women of color also believe they “should have stayed in school longer”—63 percent of African American women and 74 percent of Latina women.
Women of color strongly believe that employers and governments need to provide greater economic opportunities for workers and more flexible work-life arrangements for families. African American and Latina women are some of the strongest supporters of concrete changes to workplace structures and governmental policies to help women and workers achieve more secure and stable lives. Looking at seven different things businesses have done to improve the lives of their employees, huge majorities of women of color say each of these changes would be very useful to them. For example, 87 percent of African American women and 93 percent of Latina women say that businesses providing up to 10-days of paid sick leave would be very useful to them, compared to 81 percent of white women. Seventy-six percent of African American women and 68 percent of Latina women say it would be very useful for employers to provide more opportunities to work from home and more flexible hours; 56 percent of white women agree. Sixty-one percent of African American women and 56 percent of Latina women would find on-site child care very useful, compared to 40 percent of white women.
Moving to governmental policies, women of color are strongly supportive of measures to ensure equal pay, end pregnancy discrimination, increase the minimum wage, increase child care support and paid leave for care giving, and expanded access to college. Examining the table below, African American women are the strongest supporters of these policy changes with intense support roughly proportionate among white and Latina women. Anywhere from 59 percent to 82 percent of African American women strongly support each of these measures with 46 percent to 79 percent of white women and 44 percent to 81 percent of Latina women strongly supporting these policies.
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These findings are based on 3,500 total interviews conducted by landline and mobile telephone from August 21 through September 11, 2013. They include 1,097 white women and 665 women of color—specifically, 322 African American women and 252 Latina women. Telephone numbers were chosen randomly and in accordance with Random Digit Dial methodology. The sample was adjusted to Census proportions of sex, race or ethnicity, age, and national region.
The margin of sampling error for adults is plus or minus 1.7 points. For smaller subgroups, the margin of error is higher. Survey results may also be affected by factors such as question wording and the order in which questions were asked. The interviews were conducted in English and Spanish.
Full survey results by race and gender can be found here.
Read the executive summary for The Shriver Report here.
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Blog me.
Happy Saturday Everyone!
Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.
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Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)
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January 18th, 2014 at 3:42 pm
Just wanted to wish you a happy Saturday Michelle. What a gorgeous day in San Francisco today!
/SB
January 19th, 2014 at 8:15 am
So who cares what a few black bitches can do.
January 19th, 2014 at 8:22 am
You may not care creepo, but the rest of us do.
January 19th, 2014 at 8:28 am
Blah..blah…blah. Can we quit the self-pity plea that assumes we are so weak that we cannot possibly compete in a “man’s world”. Now that we occupy more than 50% of the job market, we have to step up and accept that in this role, our nation asks us to lead instead of asking for more legislative assistance.
My gosh, sometimes I think organizations like NOW and this site treat us as incompetent fools that need a handicap to compete in this world. I reject them and their premise. If we as women wish to compete in today’s economy, we should not ask for special assistance from our elected leaders.
This is our time. Let’s step up and help our families and our husbands to encourage good family development and good work life balance. As the majority in the workforce, we are no longer the minority; regardless of or presence in government or CEO positions. If we don’t take the risk, we don’t deserve to lead.
January 19th, 2014 at 8:32 am
@Chris, We may be the majority but we are paid 70% the inequity’s are real.
January 19th, 2014 at 8:36 am
Chris, you have to be a man posing as a woman. Men, or should we call a spade a spade, WHITE men have controlled the wage disparity from the beginning. “Progress in closing the gender wage gap has stalled during the most recent decade. The wage gap is still at the same level as it was in 2002,” said Heidi Hartmann, president of IWPR. “If the five-decade trend is projected forward, it will take almost another five decades—until 2058—for women to reach pay equity. The majority of today’s working women will be well past the ends of their working lives.”
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So please tell us how to “step up” without laws to force white men to obey the law and pay us equally.
January 19th, 2014 at 8:38 am
Chris, get a fucking grip on reality. The IWPR released a new fact sheet that tracks the pay gap from 1960 to today and analyzes changes during the past year by gender, race and ethnicity.
“While there is no silver bullet for closing the gender wage gap,” said Ariane Hegewisch, a study director at IWPR and author of the fact sheet, “strengthened enforcement of our EEO laws, a higher minimum wage and work–family benefits would go a significant way toward ensuring that working women are able to support their families.”
January 19th, 2014 at 8:45 am
Here is a little story for your dumb ass Chris. It might help you arrive at the conclusion that we as women need more than just the desire for equality, we need to elect women who will work for that equality.
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Imagine the pilot episode of a revival of the 1970’s situation comedy “The Mary Tyler Moore Show.” It is July 2013. After a painful break-up with her fiancé, 30-year-old Mary Richards relocates to Des Moines, Iowa, to start a new life.
Mary interviews for a secretarial position at a local television station with Executive Producer Lou Grant. Lou is an overweight, balding, married father of three grown daughters. Lou offers Mary an associate producer position, reporting directly to him. Lou’s wife Edie is threatened by the presence of an attractive, young woman in the workplace. Edie demands that Mary be fired immediately. Lou admits that he is attracted to Mary, even though their workplace relationship has been strictly professional. Lou fires Mary. He replaces her with Rhoda. In Iowa in 2013, Mary has no legal recourse.
This month, the Iowa Supreme Court reaffirmed its controversial December 2012 decision holding that a fifty-something Fort Dodge, Iowa dentist acted legally when he fired his 32-year-old dental assistant for being too attractive. Although the dental assistant had shown no interest in her married boss, both the dentist and his wife feared that he would be powerless to resist her charms. In a decision insulting to both major genders, the Court reasoned that the firing did not constitute gender discrimination because it was not “because of sex.” Instead, the Court reasoned, it was motivated by the dentist’s feelings of attraction for a specific person (I suppose you could call it “because of sexy”).
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If you want to see the race and sex of those 7 judges here’s the link. http://www.todaysworkplace.org/2013/07/29/iowa-supreme-court-re-affirms-statutory-right-of-jittery-insecure-spouses-to-interfere-in-the-workplace/
But you needn’t bother, because any halfwit decision like that has to come from a bunch of fucking white men bent on keeping the status quo.
January 19th, 2014 at 8:48 am
Chris, you are an idiot. More than four in 10 private-sector workers and 80% of low-wage workers do not have paid sick days. This means people, especially women who are more likely to work in low-wage jobs, constantly have to choose between their health and a paycheck.
In fact, more than 80% of low-wage workers don’t receive a single paid sick day all year. This contributes to the creation of a sickness loop: contagious kids go to school because mom can’t stay home with them; expensive emergency room trips are made that could’ve been prevented; employees show up to work and spread viruses to their customers and co-workers.
When young women can’t stay home to get their sleep and soup on, they venture out into the world where they touch handrails with contaminated hands and sneeze on things. This is the sick, sad world Daria warned us about.
The National Partnership for Women & Families reports that adults without paid sick days are 1.5 times more likely to come to work sick with a contagious illness like the flu:
For example, more than three in four food service and hotel workers (78%) don’t have a single paid sick day—and workers in child care centers and nursing homes overwhelmingly lack paid sick days. This threat to public health is clear.
January 19th, 2014 at 8:52 am
Chris#4, Perhaps if you read a little more on the subject your “Blah..blah…blah.” would have a bit more substance and you wouldn’t come off appearing as stupid as you do.
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One of the stats that always amazes is this: If the federal minimum wage had kept pace with the rising cost of living over the past 40 years, it would be $10.52 per hour today.
Instead, the minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. That translates to $15,080 per year, below the poverty line for a family of three—if the work is full-time.
Stunning as that is, it gets even worse when you realize that the majority of those paid the minimum wage are women: In 2011, more than 62 percent of minimum wage workers were women, compared with only 38 percent of male minimum wage workers, according to a new report by the Center for American Progress Action Fund.
It’s especially bad that women make up the majority of minimum wage earners because women are paid 77 cents for every dollar a typical man earns. Women of color are far more likely to hold low-wage jobs than men, and two-thirds of mothers now are either the breadwinners or co-breadwinners for their families. Their lower wages mean they will receive less from Social Security, their primary source of retirement income.
Slightly more than 2.5 million women earn the minimum wage or less, while about 1.5 million men do.
Pointedly, the report notes:
From 1968 to 2010, incomes for the top 1 percent of earners increased by 110 percent, but the inflation-adjusted value of the minimum wage has fallen by 31 percent. If the federal minimum wage had kept pace with the rising cost of living over the past 40 years, it would be $10.52 per hour today.
But these same 1 percenters are some of those who block efforts at the local and national levels to raise the minimum wage. In fact, research has shown no job loss results from reasonable minimum wage increases, even when the economy is struggling.
On the contrary, a minimum wage increase boosts consumer spending and can improve the nation’s weak economy by growing demand through increased purchasing power.
January 19th, 2014 at 8:59 am
Chris#4, are you aware that working women are the sole or co-breadwinner in two out of three families in America?
The question we should be asking is what can we do to ensure that women get a fair shot so that they are not only getting by, but also getting ahead? How do we ensure that millions working women don’t have to choose between caring for her children and losing her job?
We can start by advocating and implementing policy initiatives like paid sick leave and raising the minimum wage. All of these require legislation. If you are not aware of this get hold of a civics book and read poor child.
That is if you are a woman. Like Juanita#6, I too doubt it. You are probably like John#2, just another racist, misogynistic white male.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:01 am
Howie, I am station in your solar system. My world was not involved with the Wopre, but it was destoryed, 11 billion innocent died. Why?
January 19th, 2014 at 9:08 am
How’s this for a fact Chris#4? The New York Times’ Catherine Rampell highlighted data from Payscale, a salary tracking firm, showing that “by the time women reach age 39, their wage growth pretty much stops altogether.” By that age, the average college-educated, full-time female worker is making about $60,000. For men, meanwhile, wage growth doesn’t stop until age 48.
http://www.todaysworkplace.org/2012/05/30/chart-averge-woman’s-wages-stop-growing-when-she-turns-39/
So if we just “step up and help our families and our husbands to encourage good family development and good work life balance.” it will fix all that. How come this sounds like a different version of “a woman can’t get pregnant if she is raped because she knows how to shut that whole think down.”
Chris,the only difference between you and that idiot is he was honest enough to use his real gender when he made that fucked up statement.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:23 am
Howie, all 9 billion occupants on my planet perished when a Wopre mothership crashed into our 4 moons. It caused a shift in its elliptical orbit that brought it too close to our Sun. The heat set the entire planet ablaze.
Every living thing on it perished. My planet was not a part of the Wopre empire. It was part of a destroyed solar system in which a Wopre mothership was passing when it came under attack. I now have no place to return to when my service with the Federation is over.
Was forcing the Wopre to apologize for disrespecting Carr with idle threats that could not threaten a God worth the death and destruction that resulted when you asked Carr to punish them?
My planet has perished, and with it billions of innocent lives have been lost. So too have other planets been destroyed and trillions of innocent lives have been lost. The only good I can see from all this is that, the Wopre know that there is a force that supports Howie that is beyond their defense and Howie has appeased his lost of pride when the Wopre insulted his “God.”
Perhaps, that was worth a trillion innocent lives and the destruction of entire solar systems, but I can’t accept it. I do not have a human heart, but what I do have is heavy with lost. Very heavy.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:40 am
Howie, the Wopre suffered little more than a hand slap. Their loses amounted to a bit more than 10% of their Armada, according to the Federation. Yes, they apologized for their arrogance. But they are still in a position to continue their dominance of their part of the Universe and they are still a threat to the Emperor in other Galaxies just not the Milky Way any longer.
So you have caused a shift of power to the Emperor. Now the Federation must confront that dictator without the threat of the Wopre keeping the balance of power in check. So now there is no need for the Counsel meeting between Kirish and the Emperor’s diplomat.
The Emperor wins by default. The Web will get tighter, and the Milky Way may lose it’s opportunity to open up to earthlings an invitation to join the intergalactic community.
Sometimes it is best to just ignore the ignorant threat for the greater good. Had you asked Carr if the Wopre were capable of harming him or his progeny, He would have probably said no. Then you could have simply told the Wopre to go ahead and make the attempt. They would have learned the error of their ways directly from the attempt.
The rest of us would not have been effected. The Universe is said to be Random first, seeking to be Orderly next, on its way to Random. It does not need the arbitrary interference of …..
Less I offend, and this is repeated.
YKo//-11N/7
January 19th, 2014 at 9:47 am
Let us agree that Carr does exist. Let us also agree that this being’s power is beyond our technology and perhaps our imagination to comprehend.
Let’s also agree to sift our comments to Howie through a Counsel that is answerable to our chief commands. We have ordered no direct contact or communication with Howe without express permission from Command Central on any vessel NO EXCEPTIONS.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:49 am
Agreed.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:49 am
Affirmed.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:50 am
Affirmed.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:51 am
Affirmed.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:51 am
Affirmed.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:52 am
Affirmed.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:53 am
Affirmed and carried.