Economic Security Not Possible on Minimum Wage

McDonald’s is causing a stir with its unrealistic budgeting tool for minimum-wage employees. Not only were the amounts allocated staggeringly low (only $600 per month for rent, compared to the national average of $1,048), but the budget excluded things like heat, gas, clothing and child care.

Given that two-thirds of fast-food workers are women and almost one-third of minimum-wage earners are raising children, it’s likely that a significant number of McDonald’s employees require child care services.

A recent Restaurant Opportunities Centers United study, funded by the Ms. Foundation, found that working mothers in the restaurant industry spend an average of 35 percent of their wages on child care.

Unfortunately, the math just doesn’t add up in the McDonald’s scenario. That budget would require an additional $721 in after-tax wages to account for child care.

The fact is that no budgeting tool can truly help minimum-wage earners achieve economic security. So, we’re asking McDonald’s CEO Donald Thompson to instead pay his employees a living wage. Learn more about our campaign and sign our petition today !

Celebrating Child Care Providers

Ms. Foundation for Women Economic Justice Grantee All Our Kin shares departing reflections from policy fellow Ana Rader, who championed family child care providers, families and children online and in person. Read Ana’s full blog post here.

The family child care providers I’ve met while at All Our Kin are remarkable. Teresa Younger’s words in her keynote at our conference have stayed with me, and I’ve mulled over them often. Quoting a colleague, she said: “The best thing I can do for myself is to drop my daughter off at day care…. I have found an amazing provider who loves her, teaches her, keeps her safe and happy…. I love being at work.” Then, “Today, we celebrate who you are, what you do, and what you make possible for the rest of us to do.”

And it’s true. The work of family child care providers is the reason many other parents —many other women — can leave their homes, enter the public sphere to work and thrive. And I’m not talking about Sheryl Sandberg, here.  Family child care providers enable the women even the feminists forget — not the women “leaning in” as they rise to corporate and political power, but those entering the workforce with low-wage jobs, who might need care overnight as they work unpredictable schedules, who are grateful for an ounce of stability upon arriving in this chaotic country. And that’s important. That’s wonderful.

But these family child care providers, these women I’ve known, are far more than their value as a stepstool for other women. In a time when we often measure women’s equality by the number of women in seats in which men once sat, these family child care providers are instead redefining what it means to be a powerful, autonomous woman. They are reclaiming caregiving as a profession requiring strategy, skill, practice and patience; reclaiming the home as a space that can be lucrative, important, dynamic and rewarding. They are teaching their husbands and sons, bringing them into the home to join them as business partners and educators of young children. Siloed though they may be in their day-to-day work, at meetings and through telephone calls these family child care providers support and celebrate each other, strengthening and growing this community of women who are neither leaning in nor opting out. This, too — perhaps this, especially — is how change really happens.

Facing Hurricane Sandy, Reminders of Women Less Fortunate

By Christie Petrone

Senior Manager, Public Relations

With 8 million people, New York City can sometimes seem vast and impersonal. But the city is comprised of so many small communities, places that more often resemble small towns than a big city. It’s those women, men and children from diverse backgrounds – with wealthy and poor often living side-by-side – that form the city’s backbone. This week, each of these communities was, in some way, touched by – and, in many cases, devastated by – Hurricane Sandy.

Thousands of New Yorkers remain without power, including the Ms. Foundation’s fearless leader, President and CEO Anika Rahman. More than 100 families lost their homes in a raging fire in Queens during the hurricane. And parts of Staten Island are still under water. But the dozens of lives lost are the most heartbreaking of all.

Throughout this difficult week, my heart – and the hearts of all Ms. Foundation employees – were with women in the most vulnerable communities, those already impacted by economic injustice and struggling to cope with another blow.

When I stocked up on supplies ahead of the storm, I thought of the women who can’t afford to buy a week’s worth of water and groceries in advance.

When I shelled out $30 for baby formula for my toddler, just in case the electricity faltered and the regular milk spoiled, I thought of the women who could not risk spending money on something they might never use.

When I debated whether to evacuate my apartment – considering paying for a hotel or staying with friends – I thought of the women with limited access to resources and support systems, who had nowhere else to go.

When the Ms. Foundation closed its offices due to power outages, I didn’t worry about being paid. But I did think about the hourly wage women for whom every day away from work meant lost income – and more difficulty paying bills.

When the subways shut down, paralyzing transportation, I thought of all of the domestic employees, restaurant workers and others who don’t have the option of working from home and who risk losing their jobs because of flooded subway tunnels.

When my daughter’s daycare shut down on Tuesday, I thought of the Polish immigrants who love my daughter like their own, and I wondered if they’d still be paid.

And when her daycare reopened on Wednesday, I thought of the daycares that might still be shut, and of the low-income mothers forced to choose between going to work or caring for their children.

During every step from hurricane preparation to disaster recovery, I was reminded that the everyday struggles of those less fortunate are exponentially more challenging in emergency situations.

It reaffirmed to me why the work of the Ms. Foundation for Women is so important. And why we must never give up in our fight to achieve economic justice – equality for and among all women – certainly, in the good times, but most especially, in the bad.

Photo Credit: May S. Young

Record Poverty Rates Hit Women Hardest

The most recent U.S. poverty data paints a bleak picture for women struggling to get by in the United States. A whopping 17.7 million women (14.6 percent) lived in poverty in 2011, the highest rate our nation has experienced since 1994. Men’s poverty rate, on the other hand, was 10.9 percent, a staggering contrast.

It’s no secret that the economic slump of recent years has affected both men and women. However, women have experienced a disproportionate amount of hardship. At the Ms. Foundation, we know that much of this disparity is a result of specific issues women face in their daily working lives, including the gender wage gap, the concentration of women into low-wage positions and lack of affordable child care options.

Over the last year we have focused our economic justice work on child care because we know that it’s one of the most important ways of ensuring economic security for all women.

In the past year alone, we’ve provided $565,000 in grants to 12 organizations that are creating systemic change in the informal child care sector. We’re actively supporting a three-pronged strategy to help low-income women, immigrant women and women of color achieve economic stability – supporting policies that provide quality, flexible and accessible child care; improving working conditions for care providers; and recognizing child care as an economic development strategy that supports women’s economic security.

We don’t take these new poverty figures lightly. Without significant changes to our workplaces -- changes that allow women to balance families and careers, changes that ensure adequate pay and changes that demand a better future -- too many women will remain in this state of poverty.

Photo Credit: Elizabeth Rappaport

Working Moms are Mom Enough

Time magazine’s recent shocking cover (you know the one where a toddler is standing on a chair while nursing) with the provocative headline “Are you Mom Enough?” has spurred extensive dialogue over the subject of attachment parenting.

However, an important piece of this conversation is missing. While attachment parenting has become a phenomenon among an elite group of career moms who can afford to have their children attached to their hip (or nipple), this simply isn’t an option for many moms.

The reality is that 65% of low wage workers are women, and many of these women are mothers. These women are actually very attached. Attached to their jobs (sometimes more than one) that allow them to feed their families, put a roof over their head, and pay for their childcare.

These women are “Mom Enough,” even if they work outside the home. And, their children aren’t fated for developmental disorders or attachment issues.

Amidst all these “mommy wars,” Time magazine could have lifted up a more relevant debate by framing a discussion around core concerns for all mothers.

Addressing the gender wage gap and disparities in accessing affordable, quality day care options would be an admirable start. Addressing the lack of mandates for minimum paid parental leave after childbirth would also resonate with the larger audience of mothers who have important things to worry about (like keeping their jobs).

Working moms have enough to stress about; let’s not add the pressure of breastfeeding till the age of three to the laundry list of responsibilities working mothers already face.

When a Mother Has No Choice

While politicians scrambled to distance themselves from Hilary Rosen’s ill-chosen remarks about Ann Romney, the bigger point was overlooked.

“All moms are entitled to choose their path,” the candidate’s wife tweeted.

Unfortunately, that’s just not true.

It’s not a choice for the single mother to work three jobs to keep her family afloat when she would rather be a stay-at-home mom.

It’s not a choice for the woman whose family will lose health care benefits if she reduces her hours to care for her special-needs child.

And it’s not a choice for the woman who can’t afford not to work because her family needs her additional income to survive.

For these women, work offers a lifeline for their families. Without it, they couldn’t put food on the table or clothes on their children’s backs.

On the other end of the spectrum is the growing number of women who would prefer to work but whose salaries won’t cover the high cost of day care. For some of these women, low levels of education are a barrier in attaining jobs that pay well enough. For others, disparities in pay prevent them from earning as much as their male counterparts.

The Ms. Foundation wants every woman to have the same choices that Ann Romney did. That’s why we support organizations like All Our Kin, whose Toolkit Licensing Program helps support women who need access to affordable child care while also creating jobs for women, who constitute the majority of child care providers in the United States.

It’s why we advocate for access to affordable health care services, including contraception. And why we promote policies that help women and families achieve economic security.

Because wealth should not be a prerequisite for choice.

Guest Blog: Affordable Child Care Yields Social and Economic Benefits

Ms. Foundation for Women grantee All Our Kin authored this guest blog post about the substantial economic and community benefits of access to reliable, high-quality child care. Please join All Our Kin Jan. 19 at 9 a.m. at the Yale Club of New York City for a presentation and discussion of the University of Connecticut’s study on the economic impact of child care. Click here for more information and an event flyer.

By Shannon Hill, All Our Kin

Recently, in an interview with Melinda Henneberger, Nancy Pelosi remarked that next on her agenda is “the mother of all women’s issues: child care.” She lamented that she had never been able to find a babysitter, and that everywhere she goes women are talking about how hard it is find the kind of reliable care that would enable them to be more productive workers. When it comes to “unleashing women” in a way that would boost the economy, Pelosi said, “[child care] is the missing link.”

According to a new study conducted by the University of Connecticut Center for Economic Analysis, Pelosi is absolutely correct - investing in early childhood care and education is the missing link. It not only supports women who need access to child care in order to work, but creates jobs for women, who constitute the majority of child care providers in the United States.

The University of Connecticut study looked at an innovative child care licensing initiative implemented by Connecticut-based nonprofit All Our Kin. All Our Kin’s Tool Kit Licensing Program helps family child care providers become licensed and empowers them with the resources and skills they need to run a successful small business and provide high-quality child care.

By increasing the availability of flexible, affordable, high-quality child care, the program enables more low-income parents to work; the study estimates that for every child care provider licensed through the program, four to five parents entered the workforce.

It also increases the earning potential and quality of life for family child care providers. Sixty percent of family child care providers who became licensed through the program earned $5,000 more the first year after getting licensed, and forty-five percent of providers earned at least $10,000 more the second year. Fifty-five percent of providers used their increased income to pay down debt, forty-two percent opened a savings account, thirty-one percent moved to a larger apartment or house, and twenty-four percent bought or leased a car. Moreover, fifty percent of the child care providers went on to achieve either an Associate’s Degree in Early Childhood Education or a Child Development Associate credential.

Through its impacts on both providers and parents, the Tool Kit Licensing program generated $18.4 million in additional tax revenue and $15.2 million in gross regional product (GRP) between 2006 and 2009.

In total, the University of Connecticut study found that for every $1 spent on the Tool Kit Licensing Program, $15-20 are returned to the economy in terms of gross regional product (GRP).

That is a significant economic impact, and the findings reify something many feminists have long known: that child care is a job issue, a matter of economic justice.

Lack of access to reliable, high-quality child care makes it more difficult for parents – especially mothers - to hold or find jobs, particularly when the jobs they have or need are during nonstandard hours (forty percent of Americans work some form of nonstandard hours). And the high cost of child care, coupled with the fact that many parents have lost their child care subsidies due to state funding cuts, means that many parents cannot afford child care while they look for work or work low-wage jobs.

But parents shouldn’t have to choose between the economic survival of their family, and the safe, healthy development of their children.

It is critical that economic development and recovery plans, which have focused heavily on male-dominated industries such as construction and banking, include women and children. It is critical that these plans include family child care providers, not just because family child care providers care for the majority of our most vulnerable infants and toddlers, but because investing in them gives parents the support they need to work and has the potential to boost our economy.

It also provides our children, the workforce of tomorrow, with the educational foundation they need to succeed in school and in life. Children in high-quality early childhood education programs are less likely to be held back, drop out of school, go on welfare or commit crime. According to studies, every dollar invested in early childhood education today saves the public eight dollars later.

When that figure is combined with the immediate economic impact, it is easy to see that investing in our children, and the women who teach and care for them, really is the best of investments: the social benefits are enormous and the economic return rate is high – both today and for years to come.

Upcoming Event: Impact of Child Care Subsidies on Women of Color

Concerned about the state of child care assistance available to low-income and working class families in these troubled times? Then you may want to take some time tomorrow (Tuesday, November 2nd) to attend an important event hosted by Ms. Foundation grantee the Women of Color Policy Network, here in New York City.

"Carrying the Load: The Impact of Child Care Subsidy Policies on the Economic Security of Women of Color," will feature a roundtable discussion of the many challenges working and low-income families with young children face in accessing safe, quality, affordable child care. The panel will examine the impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act on child care subsidy funding and availability; highlight the importance of child care subsidies for working, low-income communities; and strategize policy solutions to enhance child care subsidy experiences for women of color and their families.

Panelists include: Gina Adams, Senior Fellow, Urban Institute; J. Lee Kreader, PhD, Director of Research Connections, National Center for Children in Poverty; Benita Miller, Executive Director, Brooklyn Young Mother’s Collective; and Chanelle Pearson, Research Associate, Women of Color Policy Network, NYU Wagner. The discussion will be moderated by Hannah Matthews, Senior Policy Analyst at CLASP.

The event will take place on Tuesday, November 2, 2010, from 6:30 - 8:30 PM in the Rudin Family Room (2nd Floor) of The Puck Building: 295 Lafayette Street, New York, NY.

For more information and to RSVP, please visit: http://wagner.nyu.edu/wocpn/news/calendar.php#child.

Please also note that next Tuesday's roundtable will be followed by a national webinar on child care subsidies in the states, to be held on Wednesday, November 10, 2010 at 3:00 PM (EST).

Read how our grantee, Parent Voices, is fighting for affordable child care in California.

Fighting for Affordable Child Care: Grantees Take Action

If you don't live in California you may not have heard the news, but more than 80,000 children and their families in that state are set to lose access to crucial child care subsidies as of November 1st -- leaving many families with no way to pay for child care, and wondering how they will be able to work to support their families.

The loss of these subsidies -- also known as Stage 3 state-subsidized child care funding, and offered to parents who have found employment after completing California's state-run welfare to work program (CalWORKS) -- comes as a result of a $256 million cut made to the state budget by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Though subsidies will continue to be available to current and recent members of the welfare-to-work program, parents who have been in the workforce for more than two years will have to find new ways to pay for the child care that allows them to remain in the workforce -- or as is often the case, they'll lose their jobs.

Ms. Foundation grantee Parent Voices, a California-based organization working to improve access to child care for all families in their communities, launched a campaign to fight back against these cuts -- which will, they point out, only increase unemployment and poverty levels (particularly among single-parent households, the majority of which are women-led) at a time when exactly the opposite is needed. Let's not forget: already, unemployment among single mothers has doubled since 2007 and is the highest it's been in 25 years!

Today, October 26th, Parent Voices is participating in a demonstration to demand that Stage 3 Child Care be immediately refunded. The protest is taking place outside of The Women's Conference in Long Beach (a project of the Governor's wife, Maria Shriver) and is expected to draw more than one thousand participants.

The hope is that "The Other Women's Conference" (as the protest is known) will highlight just how profoundly these cuts will impact low-income women and children and help push legislators to authorize bridge funding to keep the subsidies at least temporarily in place. Long-term, the goal of Parent Voices and other Ms. Foundation grantees is to create policies that recognize quality, affordable child care as an essential complement to quality jobs and indisputably necessary if women and families are to achieve economic security.

For more information on today's actions and future events to save Stage 3 child care funding (including a town hall meeting in Contra Costa County at the end of the week and a children's protest parade on Saturday, 10/30) visit Parent Voices.

And if you want to learn more about the state of affordable child care across the US, Ms. Foundation grantee the National Women's Law Center will be hosting a conference call on Wednesday, October 27th (tomorrow!) on this very topic. State Child Care Assistance Policies: Current Challenges for Children and Families will address how advocates are working in their states on key challenges affecting low-income families as well as providers’ access to child care assistance.

The call begins at 3 PM Eastern; please visit NWLC's registration page to RSVP for this event (registration required).

Photo: Elizabeth Rappaport, Moore Community House

On-the-Ground Leaders Explore the Economic Downturn

As we've repeatedly written, the effects of the economic downturn on women and families have put lie to the claim that we are suffering a 'mancession.' According to the National Women's Law Center and its analysis of 2009 Census data, poverty among women has climbed to 13.9 percent, the highest rate in 15 years, and rates are even higher for women of color and single mothers. More than 15.4 million children lived in poverty last year, over half of them with single mothers.

Last week in New York City, the Ms. Foundation brought together a group of dynamic grantee organizations working to address the urgent priorities of women and other workers who remain largely invisible in conversations about the economic crisis. Attending were Childspace CDI, Community Voices Heard, Jobs with Justice, LAANE, Legal Momentum, LIFETIME, Multistate Working families Consortium, the National Domestic Workers Alliance, National Partnership for Women and Families, the National Women's Law Center, Parent Voices, Restaurant Opportunities Center United (ROC United), and Wider Opportunities for Women. Together they brought to the forefront the voices of women and families nationwide that have been rocked by foreclosures, job loss and insecurity, and cuts to essential social services.

Those solutions, they insist, must place gender and social justice at the center. In addition to examining the gender dimensions of the crisis, says Ai-Jen Poo, director of the National Domestic Worker's Alliance, we have to "look at how gender actually opens solutions and pathways to power," and bring the strength of the social justice community and women's organizations together to form a larger base of support and build new power.

Groups discussed the need to deepen their connections with the broader social justice community as well as how to deepen their connections with one another – across issues, organizations and geography. Ernestine Ward from ROC noted, "We are multifaceted and try to look at every aspect of the problem to see how it all relates. We must remember as we work hard on our different issues that there is a possibility of a strong collaboration with other groups."

These collaborations are already beginning to happen. The Excluded Workers Congress -- a collaboration among numerous groups including, the National Domestic Workers Alliance, Community Voices Heard, Jobs with Justice and the National Day Laborers Organization, and Restaurant Opportunities Centers United -- brings together nine sectors of workers (including restaurant workers, taxi drivers, work-fare workers, formerly-incarcerated workers, farm workers, guest workers, gas workers, domestic workers, and workers who receive less pay in the South) who are excluded explicitly or implicitly from labor laws. The congress unites traditional labor, workers' centers and social justice advocates to fight for a common dream of an economy that respects all work and offers justice to all workers. Sarita Gupta, of Jobs with Justice said, "We must get people to start thinking about broadening the worker rights movement and find collective ways in which to fight for an economy that works for working people."

It was gender-justice solutions like this that grantees then brought the following day to Reinvesting in Women and Families: Developing an Economy for the Future, a summit organized by the National Council for Research on Women. And as Sara K. Gould, Ms. Foundation President & CEO, said in her opening remarks at the summit, their expertise is crucial: "Those most directly affected by the problem have to be part of the solution."

We and our grantee partners know that women, families and communities must be at the center of the dialogue and that we must address the current economy with a holistic framework that takes into account a diversity of experiences, needs and solutions. Together, our grantee partners are creating new pathways to power and security for all workers and an economy that ensures justice for all.

Photos by Kasia Gladki. Ms. Foundation grantees meet to explore gender, jobs, and justice, October 7, 2010.

Ms. Foundation Featured in International Museum of Women Online Exhibit

The Ms. Foundation for Women is featured in the International Museum of Women's online exhibition, ECONOMICA: Women and the Global Economy. As the UN Summit on the Millennium Development Goals renews its commitment to improving the health and security of women and children as essential to alleviating global poverty, we also have the responsibility to address the economic distress that women and children face here at home.

Today, amid economic uncertainty, women are often alone standing between their families and poverty, foreclosure, or worse. Susan Wefald, chief operating officer at the Foundation, contributed a powerful and moving essay to the exhibition that

Read more »

Grantee Shows Census Data Paints Dire Picture for Women and Families

We frequently comment on the devastating impact of the economic crisis on women, particularly low income women, women of color and single heads of households. Our grantee partners are advocating tirelessly for inclusive and just economic policies that support women, families and their communities.

Now, our grantee, the National Women's Law Center, has analyzed the newly released 2009 Census data. The numbers paint a dire picture.

Read more »

TANF Sanctions Threaten America's Neediest

There's an epidemic in America's most vulnerable communities -- and federal policies are directly responsible for its spread. Widespread and erroneous financial sanctions are leaving TANF recipients with less money in their pockets, if not shut out of the system entirely.

Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) is designed to offer America's neediest families crucial financial support during times of crisis. But according to a recent report from Ms. Foundation grantee Legal Momentum, financial sanctions -- commonly and erroneously imposed for minor violations -- have resulted in hundreds of thousands of families being denied full access to the benefits they've been awarded.

The report -- "The Sanction Epidemic in the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families Program" [pdf] -- found that in 2008, 85,000 families a month received reduced benefits (or "partial" sanctions), with an average reduction of $146, about 38% of the $383 average monthly TANF grant. According to Legal Momentum, these sanctions "often come as a result of minor violations" --including something as simple as "failing to file a document."

...The report describes the case of “a 43-year-old black woman, living in an emergency shelter and suffering from both shingles and AIDS, who was sanctioned for failing to attend an appointment at the Department of Labor. According to her, when she called the Department of Labor to say she would be 20 minutes late for her appointment she was told it was too late and was sanctioned.

As a result of these sanctions, desperate families find themselves struggling even harder to survive; as Legal Momentum points out, "sanctioned TANF families often report maternal or child hunger, eviction or homelessness, and lack of medical care."

But there's more: in addition to these partial sanctions, states are also within their rights -- and encouraged by federal policies -- to visit "full" sanctions on beneficiaries who commit minor infractions. Full sanctions deprive TANF families of 100% of their benefits, leaving these families without resources to support themselves. This in turn has lead to a significant reduction in the overall number of families receiving aid of any kind: in 1995, 84% of eligible families participated in the program; in 2005, that number had dropped to just 40%.

You'd think that this discrepancy between need and actual awards would raise a red flag among the powers that be. But with state budgets under extreme stress, it seems that government officials are turning a blind eye to the impact of these inflexible policies on families in their states if it means reducing the "welfare rolls."

As Congress looks at extending TANF subsidies through September of 2011, Legal Momentum is urging policymakers to correct the application of sanctions, to ensure that they become both "fair and rare." Families in crisis deserve to be treated with as much humanity as anyone else; it's Congress's job to make sure that TANF starts to treat its beneficiaries not as numbers, but as actual human beings.

Urge Congress to Pass the Child First Act!

Ms. Foundation grantee The National Women's Law Center wants you to ask your member of Congress to support the Child First Act of 2010 -- and so do we!

What is the Child First Act? According to NWLC's Womenstake blog, it's a crucial piece of legislation that would,

...increase child care funding through the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program (TANF) by $800 million a year over five years, with an adjustment for inflation. The increased funding would allow approximately 117,500 more children to have access to safe and affordable child care.

In addition, the Act would ensure that the minimum child care health and safety standards required for providers receiving Child Care and Development Block Grant funding also apply to providers receiving funding through TANF.

Finally, the Act would ensure that states could not withhold or reduce cash assistance to a single parent with children under age 13 who does not meet TANF work requirements because of the unavailability of appropriate, affordable child care arrangements. Currently, this provision only applies to parents with children under six, despite the importance of safe care for school-age children.

The act was introduced by Senators John Kerry and Blanche Lincoln and Congressman Joseph Crowley on Wednesday -- but if it's going to pass, it needs the support of many more members of Congress. Reach out to your representatives and senators today and urge them to support this important piece of legislation for America's children!

Check out how another Ms. Foundation grantee, The Mississippi Low-Income Child Care Initiative, is working to provide quality childcare for children across the state of Mississippi.

Newsweek Crows: Women Will Rule the World

With so much economic talk circling around the myth of the "mancession" -- which casts men (incorrectly) as the primary victims of this recession -- it's rare to find an article that actually looks at where women stand in this world economy, and the contributions they will likely make in driving economic recovery here in the US and across the globe.

Which is why, despite their initial reliance on the same old myths that make men the "real" losers in this recession, we were so pleased to read Jessica Bennett and Jesse Ellison's piece in this week's Newsweek, enticingly titled Women Will Rule the World. The article offers a great deal of exciting evidence that women in the United States and other Western nations have a real shot at achieving economic parity over the coming decades, and offers some useful statistics about the economic power we currently wield. As the authors note:

American women are already the breadwinners or co-breadwinners in two thirds of American households; in the European Union, women filled 75 percent of the 8 million new jobs created since 2000. Even with the pay gap factored into the equation, economists predict that by 2024, the average woman in the U.S. and a number of rich European countries will outearn the average man. And she’ll be spending that money: American women are responsible for 83 percent of all consumer purchases; they hold 89 percent of U.S. bank accounts, 51 percent of all personal wealth, and are worth more than $5 trillion in consumer spending power -- larger than the entire Japanese economy.

Those are big numbers -- numbers worth celebrating and milestones worth committing ourselves to achieving in the coming years. And as the authors point out, there's also good news to be had on the global stage: in the developing world, the number of women attaining higher levels of education and entering the workforce is decidedly on the rise -- a significant fact not least of all because women are known to reinvest the vast majority of their income into community and family, providing one of the few viable pathways to ending global poverty as we know it.

But we're not there yet. For all of the happy news the authors have to share, it is also worth remembering that women remain at an economic disadvantage in just about every country in the world. Women and girls make up 70% of the more than 1 billion people living in poverty globally, and here in the US we still seem incapable of closing the pay gap that keep women earning 76 cents to every man's dollar.

Bennett and Ellison are certainly within bounds to conclude that achieving economic parity for women appears increasingly likely -- but it would be a mistake to assume that we've either reached the plane of inevitability or that these economic opportunities will come to all women in equal measure. Here in the US, factors like race, class, sexuality and disability will continue to play a role in determining economic power; despite this rosy forecast, the work to even the proverbial playing field must continue on.

Learn more about how the Ms. Foundation is working to ensure Economic Justice for women and families throughout the US.

Photo: by Elizabeth Rappaport, Women in Construction, Gulf Coast, Mississippi, December 2008

Fair Pay: Imagine the Difference $10,000 Could Make

Ms. Foundation grantee the National Women's Law Center is offering its constituents a great opportunity to speak out on the pay gap between women and men -- which currently adds up, on average, to just over $10,000 per year.

Via NWLC's Womenstake blog:

What if you found out you were owed $10,622?
There’s a $10,622 gap between the median yearly earnings of men and women. For many women and their families, fixing the wage gap would mean enough for a year’s supply of groceries, three months of rent or child care, six months of health insurance, and more.
What would it mean to you? Send us a photo that shows how $10,622 would improve your life!

On June 10th, the anniversary of the Equal Pay Act, NWLC will gather these photos together and send them to Congress to press for quick passage of the Paycheck Fairness Act. They'll also publish the pictures on their site.

So how would equal pay impact your life? Let NWLC know. And learn more about NWLC's campaign to close the gendered pay divide once and for all.

Request for Proposals for Economic Justice and ARRA Implementation

The Ms. Foundation for Women is pleased to announce an Open Request for Proposals for Economic Justice and ARRA Implementation.

The passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) in 2009 made hundreds of billions of dollars available for economic stimulus for infrastructure investment, job training and creation, and funds for extending unemployment and emergency benefits, just to name a few. Since then, states and municipalities have exercised wide discretion in choosing which reforms to implement and which funds to accept, and a lack of transparency and accountability has prevented dollars from reaching communities most in need.

The Ms. Foundation’s priority is to ensure that women, particularly low-income women and women of color, who have been disproportionately impacted by the economic recession, benefit to the greatest degree possible from ARRA implementation.

In this Request for Proposals, the Ms. Foundation seeks to complement our overall grantmaking for economic justice by supporting two specific areas of ARRA implementation, both with significant long-term impact on the meaningful participation of low-income women and women of color in the economy:

• Expanding the availability of affordable child care and improving the quality of child care jobs.
  
  
• Securing training and job set-asides for women in emerging green sectors.

The deadline for all applications is Monday 29 March 2010, 2:00 p.m. EDT.

More details and a full application packet.

See Sara Gould's recent post on ARRA, Child Care, Green Jobs and Grassroots Advocacy.

Our Nation's Recovery Depends on Those Most in Need of Jobs

On Tuesday, Bob Herbert wrote a compelling column about how those most affected by today's economic crisis are also the most forgotten. "What you’re not hearing from the politicians and the talking heads," Herbert writes, "is that the joblessness and underemployment in America’s low-income households rival their heights in the Great Depression of the 1930s — and in some instances are worse."

Herbert highlights new data from a Northeastern University study of U.S. households that examined unemployment rates during the last quarter of 2009 by annual household income. Not surprisingly, they found alarming disparities:

The highest group, with household incomes of $150,000 or more, had an unemployment rate of 3.2 percent. ...The unemployment rate of the lowest group, which had annual household incomes of $12,499 or less...was a staggering 30.8 percent. That’s more than five points higher than the overall jobless rate at the height of the Depression.

...When the data about underemployment is factored in...the picture only worsens. In the lowest group, the underemployment rate was 20.6 percent, compared with just 1.6 percent in the highest group.

Herbert is not trying to diminish the impact of the crisis on the middle class. Instead he argues:

The point here is that those in the lower-income groups are in a much, much deeper hole than the general commentary on the recession would lead people to believe. And none of the policy prescriptions being offered by the administration or the leaders of either party in Congress would in any way substantially alleviate the plight of those groups.

We talk about the recession as if all of its victims were suffering equally, and all will be helped by some bland, class-and-category-neutral solution.

That is so wrong.

Herbert is so right. None of the economic recovery policies we've seen thus far sufficiently addresses the urgent needs of low-income people and their communities. This again begs the question advocates have been asking for some time: How will our country recover if we don't respond -- and listen -- to those most affected?

Of course, a significant percentage of those most affected are women, who make up nearly 70 percent of minimum- and below-minimum-wage workers. In fact, "a majority of women workers," according to Ms. Foundation grantee Wider Opportunities for Women (WOW), "earn only about two times the federal poverty line, or $20,140 in 2010 for a mother and one child."

Our next opportunity to address the priorities and solutions of low-income people, including low-income women and an especially vulnerable group, households headed by women, is through a comprehensive jobs bill. And as our colleague Deepak Bhargava of the Center for Community Change says, this has to come with an adequate price tag.

Ms. Foundation grantees have already been advocating for a jobs program to meet women's needs. In December, WOW issued "A Women's Agenda for Job Creation" [PDF]. Today, they continue to push for the incorporation of their solutions into the final Congressional bill. WOW has already made progress: their suggested "nonprofit tax credit" [PDF] made its way into President Obama's recent jobs proposal. Now let's see if Congress can improve even further upon the White House plan. And let's remind them that the fate of the entire country is tied to those who need jobs the most.

Sara K. Gould
President & CEO
Ms. Foundation for Women

Ms. Foundation Grantees Promote Women's Access to Green Jobs

Earlier this year, the Ms. Foundation issued grants to national organizations and coalitions with the potential to take advantage of progressive openings created by the new presidential administration. By supporting strategies that connect grassroots solutions to national advocacy, the Ms. Foundation is working to ensure that the communities with the greatest need benefit from policy change in areas that are likely to re-shape the social and economic infrastructure of our nation: health care reform, green jobs, workers’ rights, child care and immigration.

Two Ms. Foundation grantees, Wider Opportunities for Women (WOW) and Green For All, have been focusing in particular on ensuring equitable access to green jobs for women, low-income people and people of color. Green jobs, like those in construction and other building trades, are more likely to offer a living wage and, because this is a new and rapidly expanding field, long-term economic security.

Last week, with funding from the Ms. Foundation, WOW held the first national institute for organizations from across the country seeking to train women in green jobs. This week, we share a video from Green For All which highlights how stimulus funds are already being put to use to train women in weatherization:

Tahlia is a single mother of a 3-year-old son in Brooklyn, NY. "Construction is something that I wanted to do for a long time," she said. "I had no way of knowing how to get into this field because I always heard it was a man's world."

Now, thanks to the Recovery Act, Tahlia has a job weatherizing homes in New York.

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5U6ZO-3XGw

Learn more from Green For All's Green Economy Roadmap.

New York Times Editorial: Pass the Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights

An editorial in today's New York Times calls on Albany, which "has not been able to govern its way out of a paper bag" to "bestow some fundamental rights and protections on the invisible workers whose labors are a cornerstone of the New York economy."

Bringing domestic workers up to parity with employees in other industries is the just, responsible and long-overdue action for New York State. See our recent postings from the Ms. Foundation’s Outrageous Acts campaign and learn how to contact your legislators to ask that they vote in favor of the Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights, legislation that was drafted by our grantee, Domestic Workers United. There is currently a tremendous opportunity for victory: If New York State lawmakers can put aside their differences in time to pass the bill, Governor Patterson has pledged to sign it into law. The full text of the Times editorial follows.

The Rights of Domestic Workers
New York Times Editorial
June 15, 2009

There are more than 200,000 workplaces in New York State where fundamental labor standards do not apply, not even in theory. These are not sweatshops or salt mines. They are private homes, where housekeepers, nannies and caregivers for the elderly do work as important as it is isolated and unprotected.

The exclusion is a relic of the New Deal, when labor protections like overtime pay were written specifically to exclude domestic and farm labor. From exclusion it can be a short distance to abuse: to long hours, low pay, dehumanizing treatment, physical and sexual harassment.

Domestic workers and their advocates in New York have been pressing for reforms. They have been telling their stories in Albany and across the state and steadily gathering support for a Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights. The legislation, the first of its kind in the nation, would reform state labor law to provide basic protections like time-and-a-half pay for every hour over a 40-hour week; one day off a week; paid vacation and sick days; severance pay and health coverage — and a means of enforcing these standards in court.

Most other workers take these standards for granted. They don’t know what it’s like to have to show up for work sick rather than be fired, to be denied privacy and dignity, to be powerless to demand decent treatment from their employers.

Backers of the bill had been confident that this could finally be the year for a groundbreaking victory, at least before the recent power struggle brought the Capitol to new depths of shame, ridicule and paralysis.

If the Legislature decides to return to its senses and start passing meaningful legislation that improves New Yorkers’ lives, it should include the Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights. Albany, which has not been able to govern its way out of a paper bag, should at least be able to bestow some fundamental rights and protections on the invisible workers whose labors are a cornerstone of the New York economy.