Disparities

Close, but No Degree

Submitted by asklar on Sun, 04/15/2012 - 12:45am

Even in New Jersey’s highly educated workforce, with 44 percent of adults possessing at least a two‐year degree, almost a fifth of adults age 25‐64 have started college but never finished.

Inexpensive policy changes can enable the state’s agencies and colleges to improve college completion rates in the state and simultaneously meet workforce goals, according to a new report,Close, but No Degree, by the Center for Women and Work (CWW) at the School of Management and Labor Relations at Rutgers University.

URL:

http://smlr.rutgers.edu/cww-report-close-but-no-degree

Member Organization:

Center for Women and Work

Fewer Workouts, Greater Health Risks for Women

Teaser:

A nationwide study, conducted at Oregon State University in Corvallis, found that women get only about 18 minutes of moderate to vigorous exercise per day, while men get 30 minutes of moderate to vigorous exercise daily, on average.

Editorial:

From Everyday Health:

For objective results, the research team tracked the daily physical activity of more than 1,000 men and women across the country via accelerometers worn by the participants.

Published in the journal Preventative Medicine, their findings reveal women aren't even coming close to the recommended 150 minutes of moderate physical activity per week. Stats from this study line up with the results of a recent survey from the American Heart Association, which found that only 12 percent of Americans report regular practice of three key healthy habits (good nutrition, exercise, and oral care). The biggest excuse was lack of time.

But failing to get 30 minutes of physical activity per day hurts your health, according to the study authors.

"It's pretty striking what happens to you if you don't meet that 30 minutes a day of activity," says Bradley Cardinal, PhD, a OSU professor of social psychology of physical activity who co-led the study, in a release. "Women in our sample had better health behavior. They were much less likely to smoke, for instance, but the lack of activity still puts them at risk."

[...]

Source:

Everyday Health

URL:

http://www.everydayhealth.com/high-cholesterol/0412/fewer-workouts-greater-health-risks-for-women.aspx

Date:

April 15, 2012

Affiliate:

Associated Issues & Expertise:

Women on boards: one year on

Submitted by asklar on Sat, 04/14/2012 - 11:58pm

Lord Davies has published the first annual progress report on his ground-breaking review of Women on Boards.

URL:

http://www.bis.gov.uk/news/topstories/2012/Mar/women-on-boards-one-year-on

The Wage Gap State by State: 2012 Fact Sheets

Submitted by asklar on Fri, 04/13/2012 - 10:45am

State by state factsheets from the National Women's Law Center.

At the time of the Equal Pay Act's passage in 1963, women working full time, year-round were paid merely 59 cents for every dollar paid to their male counterparts. Enforcement of the Equal Pay Act and related civil rights laws has helped to narrow the wage gap, but significant disparities remain and must be addressed.

URL:

http://www.nwlc.org/resource/wage-gap-state-state-2012-fact-sheets

Member Organization:

National Women's Law Center

Why Mitt Romney's 'Economic War on Women' Charge Could Backfire

Teaser:

Presidential candidate Mitt Romney claims that 92 percent of the jobs lost since President Obama took office belonged to women, but laying the blame on the Obama adminstration could backfire.

Editorial:

From The Atlantic:

Facing a double-digit deficit among female voters, likely Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney has accused the White House of waging an economic "war on women." Since Obama took office in January 2009, he's charged, an amazing 92 percent of all job losses have been among women.

He's absolutely right. In the last 26 months, U.S. payrolls have shrunk by 740,000 jobs and of those, 683,000 belonged to women, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

But Romney should be careful with his talking point. All those women who lost work? About two-thirds of them were laid off from government jobs. And a lot of them lived in states governed by Republicans.

The Romney campaign is counting job losses that occurred literally the day Obama took office, which is a bit like blaming the fire fighter for not traveling back in time to stop the fire.

[...]

Source:

The Atlantic

URL:

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/04/why-mitt-romneys-economic-war-on-women-charge-could-backfire/255754/

Date:

April 12, 2012

Affiliate:

Associated Issues & Expertise:

Women's Demand for Reproductive Control: Understanding and Addressing Gender Barriers

Submitted by asklar on Thu, 04/12/2012 - 10:19am

Millions of women each year experience unintended pregnancies, and millions more have unmet need for family planning. One of the persistent gaps in knowledge is the role of gender barriers that women face in defining and achieving their reproductive intentions. This paper provides a gender analysis of women’s demand for reproductive control. This analysis illuminates how the social construction of gender affects fertility preferences, unmet need, and the barriers that women face to using contraception and safe abortion. It also helps to bridge important dichotomies in the population, family planning, and reproductive health fields.

Jennifer McCleary-Sills, Allison McGonagle, Anju Malhotra
2012

URL:

http://www.icrw.org/publications/womens-demand-reproductive-control

Member Organization:

International Center for Research on Women

Job Growth Slows for Women and Men in March

Submitted by asklar on Thu, 04/12/2012 - 10:08am

According to IWPR analysis of the April employment report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, job growth slowed in March with 120,000 jobs added to nonfarm payrolls. In March women gained 38,000 jobs (about one-third of all jobs added) and men gained 82,000. Women’s employment growth was aided by strong growth in health care (26,000 jobs added overall) and food service and drinking places (36,900 jobs added overall). The gap between women’s and men’s employment in March is 1.9 million.

The unemployment rates remained largely steady from February to March, declining for women aged 16 and older (to 8.1 percent from 8.2 percent), and unchanged for men (8.3 percent). As of March 12.7 million workers remain unemployed.

(April 2012)

URL:

http://www.iwpr.org/publications/pubs/job-growth-slows-for-women-and-men-in-march

Member Organization:

Institute for Women’s Policy Research

Simple Truth About the Pay Gap (2012)

Submitted by asklar on Thu, 04/12/2012 - 10:02am

Equal pay is important for women's economic well-being and that of their families. When men and women are paid differently for comparable work, women have fewer resources to support themselves and their families, to invest in additional education for themselves and their children, and to provide for retirement.

URL:

http://www.aauw.org/learn/research/simpleTruth.cfm

IBM's Rometty was at Masters, in a pink jacket

Teaser:

Virginia Rometty appeared at the U.S. Masters golf tournament in a pink jacket, not the green associated with membership in the male-only Augusta National typically bestowed on IBM CEOs, the AP reports.

Editorial:

From USA Today:

In a pink jacket, however, not a green one.

Rometty, sitting in a lawn chair, had a prime location just a few rows behind the 18th green. She is known to be an avid scuba diver, not much of a golfer. But she knew enough about the game to applaud several good shots into the final hole.

Rometty has brought the issue of female members at Augusta National back to the fore since being named IBM's new chief executive earlier this year. IBM is one of the longtime sponsors of the tournament, and its last four CEOs, all males, were invited to be members. Augusta National's chairman, Billy Payne, has refused to provide a substantive answer to that question, saying the club's membership decisions are private.

IBM has also declined to comment, and security around the company's hospitality cabin at Augusta was tight all week.

[...]

Source:

USA Today

URL:

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/golf/story/2012-04-08/masters-ibm-rometty/54118752/1

Date:

April 9, 2012

Affiliate:

Associated Issues & Expertise:

More women vets are homeless, but housing scarce

Teaser:

CBS reports on the increasing levels of homelessness among female veterans.

Editorial:

From CBS:

Once primarily male veteran problems, homelessness and economic struggles are escalating among female veterans, whose numbers have grown during the past decade of U.S. wars while resources for them haven't kept up. The population of female veterans without permanent shelter has more than doubled in the last half-dozen years and may continue climbing now that the Iraq war has ended, sending women home with the same stresses as their male counterparts — plus some gender-specific ones that make them more susceptible to homelessness.

The problem, a hurdle to the Obama administration's stated goal of ending veterans' homelessness by 2015, is exacerbated by a shortage of temporary housing specifically designed to be safe and welcoming to women or mothers with children. The spike comes even as the overall homeless veteran population has gone down, dropping by nearly 12 percent to about 67,500 between January 2010 and January 2011, officials say.

[...]

Source:

CBS News

URL:

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-501363_162-57411007/more-women-vets-are-homeless-but-housing-scarce/

Date:

April 9, 2012

Affiliate:

Associated Issues & Expertise:

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NCRW is a network of leading university and community based research, policy, and advocacy centers with a growing global reach dedicated to advancing rights and opportunities for women and girls. We also have a Corporate Circle comprised of senior diversity professionals from leading U.S. and global member companies and a Presidents Circle of college and university leaders who share our commitment. NCRW harnesses the collective power of its network to provide knowledge, analysis, and thought leadership on issues ranging from reducing women’s poverty to building a critical mass of women’s leadership across sectors.

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