Low-Income Workers and Families

We’re on Day 4 of the first federal government shutdown in 17 years. Here in D.C., the subway and the streets are noticeably emptier without thousands of federal workers on the job. Read more »

Imagine that you’re a live-in housekeeper. One day, your employer asks you to sign an arbitration agreement – meaning that should any claims arise against your employer, they will be handled out of court. You sign. Later on, you accept a subpoena on behalf of your boss. He proceeds to beat you up. When you sue him, the court points to the arbitration agreement and tells you the matter must be worked out outside of court. Read more »

I have a confession to make: I love McDonald’s French fries. When I was in college, during particularly stressful finals or mid-terms weeks, I would go to the campus McDonald’s and order myself a small fries. I’d time my visit around when I knew the fries were likely to be fresh and excitedly hop on my toes waiting for that crispy, salty goodness.

Nowadays, when I think back to my trips to those glowing golden arches, I can’t help but think about minimum wage and low-wage workers; and no matter how delicious those French fries tasted, I can’t help but leave with a bit of a sour taste in my mouth and feel as though those arches have lost their luster.

NWLC’s analyses show that two-thirds of minimum-wage and tipped-wage workers are women, 60% of women’s job gains in the recovery are in the ten largest low-wage jobs. NWLC analysis of the Census Bureau’s most recent numbers show that the overall poverty rate hasn’t budged much, with 18.4 percent of families with children in poverty, and 14.5 percent of women compared with 11.0 percent of men living in poverty.  More than one in seven women – 17.8 million – live in poverty.  Read more »

We all know it can be hard to come back to work after a long weekend. For those of you fighting for women’s equality, here are 10 reasons to roll up your sleeves on the Tuesday after Labor Day: Read more »

August 26th marks Women’s Equality Day, the anniversary of the passage of the 19th amendment prohibiting U.S. citizens from being denied the right to vote on account of sex. The 19th amendment is widely known for giving women the right to vote. Read more »

The Bureau of Labor Statistics released the monthly jobs data for July today and the numbers tell the story of a recovery that is just too slow.

There was good news in July as adult women’s unemployment rate matched its recovery-era low at 6.5 percent. However, this rate is still 1.5 times as high as the unemployment rate for adult women when the recession began in December 2007. Additionally – adult African-American women, adult Hispanic women, and single moms all still have unemployment rates several percentage points above this level.

July also proved to be a less-than-impressive month on the jobs front. The economy added 162,000 jobs in July, 117,000 of which were gained by women. However, adding 162,000 jobs each month is far below what we need to get back to pre-recession employment levels including absorbing the growth in the population. In fact, here’s a (sad) fact for the day: at this pace, it will take nearly 11 years, until 2024, to close the jobs gap, according to estimates by the Hamilton Project. Read more »

A new analysis released by NWLC today reveals a startling new fact: 60 percent of women’s job gains in the recovery are in low-wage jobs. That’s right: 60 percent. Twenty percent of men’s job gains in the recovery are in low-wage jobs.

Here are the top six things you need to know about the kinds of jobs women and men are gaining in the recovery:

1. These jobs are in a variety of industries – but they are mostly service jobs.

We examined the 10 largest low-wage jobs (defined in this analysis as jobs that typically pay less than $10.10 per hour).  That list includes childcare workers; maids and housekeepers; home health aides; personal care aides; cashiers; waiters and waitresses; combined food preparers and servers; bartenders; food preparation workers; and hand packers and packagers.

2. The massive gain in low-wage jobs represents a sharp downward trend for women workers.

Sixty percent of the total net increase in employment for women between 2009, the first year of the recovery, and 2012 came in these 10 jobs.  This represents disproportionate growth in low-wage jobs, since these jobs employed less than 15 percent of all working women in 2009.

Yesterday, the National Institute for Early Education Research released the latest version of its annual report, The State of Preschool 2012, and it contained very discouraging news. Between the 2010-2011 and 2011-2012 school years, total state prekindergarten funding fell by $548 million and spending per child dropped by $442 (after adjusting for inflation). Enrollment in state prekindergarten had virtually stalled; as in the previous year, just 28 percent of four-year-olds and 4 percent of three-year-olds were served in state prekindergarten programs in 2011-2012. Only five states (Alabama, Alaska, Louisiana, North Carolina, and Rhode Island) had prekindergarten programs that met all ten of NIEER’s quality standards benchmarks. Ten states—Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Mississippi, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, and Wyoming—had no prekindergarten program in 2011-2012 (although just this month, Mississippi approved legislation establishing a prekindergarten program).

Given the importance of prekindergarten in giving children a strong start, clearly more needs to be done to ensure that adequate resources are provided to support prekindergarten, that strong standards are in place to provide children with high-quality learning experiences, and that prekindergarten is widely accessible to children who need it—particularly low- and moderate-income children. Read more »

Once upon a time (last year), I taught 4th grade at a Title I school in rural Louisiana.  We went to school Tuesday through Friday.  Yes, that’s right – only 4 DAYS A WEEK. In 2006 the underfunded and low performing school district desperately needed to find a way to save money, so the school board had to cut out Mondays.

Last week Paul Ryan released his budget and guess what - in FY13 it CUTS $15.8 million in funding from Title I schools (schools where over 75% of students qualify for free or reduced lunch) in Louisiana alone!  In FY14 it adds a whopping $54.9 million in additional cuts to Louisiana schools.  By the end of 2014, under Ryan’s plan, over 4 million of the most vulnerable children across the country would lose access to education services. 

According to House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan this is the “The Path to Prosperity.”  Is that a joke?  Read more »

Sheryl Sandberg is telling women to “lean in.” She's encouraging us to strive for bigger and better jobs. She's telling us to resist “leaving before we leave” in anticipation of having families. Through her “lean in circles,” women will have opportunities to share success stories about how leaning in to their careers, while also having families, worked for them.

Here’s the problem: “Leaning in” any further is not an option for most low-wage working women, any more than choosing to leave their jobs is an option. They’re already leaning in, with all their might.

In families with children in the bottom 20% of the income distribution, nearly 70% of working wives are either the primary breadwinners for their families or share that responsibility equally with their husbands [PDF]. But the hourly wages that women at the bottom of the labor market earn are often simply not enough to get by – nearly two-thirds of workers earning the minimum wage are women. Many women in low-wage jobs are working more than one job to sustain their families, since they can't get enough hours at a single job to make ends meet. Read more »