News Flash - Women are Equal to Men - in Terms of Losing Their Careers!

One of the more amazing spins of the day is how the term diversity has been cast to mean global labor. The original term was for United States Domestic diversity. In other words, giving equal opportunity in a nation to all of her citizens.

Well, there are now damning reports coming to light on what is happening to a large segment of the American Professionals and that is women.

The Joint Economic Committee of Congress released a report entitled Equality in Job Loss: Women Are Increasingly Vulnerable to Layoffs During Recessions.

According to the JEC:

  • The 2001 recession hit the jobs that women held especially hard. Unlike in the recessions of the early 1980s and 1990s, during the 2001 recession, the percent of jobs lost by women often exceeded that of men in the industries hardest hit by the downturn.
  • The lackluster recovery of the 2000s made it difficult for women to regain their jobs – women’s employment rates never returned to their pre-recession peak.

Noted in this report:

The 2001 Recession Signaled End of Long-term Rise in Women’s Employment Rate

This report, I find fairly odious in some respects, for the biased assumptions, implications are strong that a male is the breadwinner of the family and this just is not keeping with the principles of equality or with the economic realities on the ground. Women need careers, incomes the same as anyone else and if they are cut, there is not some Prince Charming in the wings ready to whisk them away to some fantasy economic salvation. Nope. They go bankrupt, homeless and broke the same as their male counterparts. The good news is this report is at least somewhat recognizing that, but it's clear US domestic diversity and equality is moving backwards from this conclusion:

It erases more than 12 years of gains in terms of women joining the workforce

One question I have on this study is while they show women in Professional fields are on equal par with men in terms of labor arbitrage, does that take into account women are strongly underrepresented in career areas of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM)?

Another study,The Athena Factor: Reversing the Brain Drain in Science, Engineering, and Technology (covered by ABC news):

52% of women in private-sector science and technology jobs drop out [of their careers] without returning, a vast majority between the ages of 35 to 44.

Now my question is did they really drop out...or were they forced out?

Note the age range block. This happens to correlate to the typical pivot point where institutionalized age discrimination occurs in these fields.

According to the National Science Foundation, women make up 56% of the graduate school population (aggregate, it varies widely per occupation). The top reason women drop out is the workplace hostility. Last I saw that was not legal under U.S. discrimination law, yet this is the top reason cited. Could it be that by not ensuring a safe work environment, instead promoting global labor arbitrage, culturally, corporations are importing values that do not adhere to United States workplace laws?

The second issue cited is extreme jobs. Translate that to working to death. There is only a hint that global labor arbitrage might be partially responsible. The President of the Association of Women in Science states:

American men are increasingly are not wanting to take on these extreme jobs either, particularly as they are sharing home and family responsibilities with their partners. This is why you see large companies calling for relaxing H1B visas limits to bring in more professionals because the amount of work-per-dollar-paid just doesn't look attractive to Americans anymore.

Although I certainly suggest the global wage arbitrage of professionals in these fields has deterred students from entering them, I question if most voluntarily simply quit. I see no data to date on whether this 52% drop out rate is voluntary or not. Additionally, last I saw requiring people to work these 80+ kind of hours was outside of the 40 hour work week. I'm not sure if it is illegal per say, but assuredly it should be.

Some other astute observations:

For those large tech companies, that travel to Capitol Hill every year to ask for raising limits on H1B work visas, the issue of attracting those women back into the work force should be of utmost importance.

The talent is actually sitting in their back yard.

Sure is and I also suggest that talent is sitting in their backyard broke!

So while bias and global labor arbitrage are not spelled out in these reports, it certainly implies corporations prefer guest worker Visa holders willing to work themselves to death, not have families and work for much less pay than US workers with long term careers.

Sylvia Ann Hewlett, one of the studies authors, writes in an article titled, Focus on the female talent in the backyard:

41% of highly qualified specialists on the lower rungs of corporate career ladders in these areas in the US are female.

So, will global labor arbitrage and the consequences of eroding US domestic diversity be further examined? It's yet to be seen, but the Race to the Bottom globalization implications are teetering on the edge from these recent reports.

Even more telling, a bill H.R. 6314: Fulfilling the Potential of Women in Academic Science and Engineering Act of 2008, was introduced to try to address sexism/gender bias in STEM. Watered down, the focus is on statistics, training, sensitivity programs in federally funded research and within Academia. While these sorts of efforts are sorely needed, assuredly seminars, awareness and education assists greatly in reducing US domestic diversity adversity down the road, I think nothing will happen until Americans are put first for jobs within the United States.

This isn't about warm fuzzies, hand holding, bonding and mentoring programs. This is about money, career, advancement and investment. The United States needs to take the bull by the horns and start investing in Americans, all Americans.

Meta: 

Comments

Year 2001: The Year Women Left STEM Occupations

I can assure you, the women did not voluntarily leave their Tech jobs. They were forced out in droves. The Tech boom opened the doors to women and blacks like never before in the Technologies Industries. When the bubble burst, "Last Ones In" were the "First To Go". They left the high paying jobs in IT for low paying jobs in industries other than Tech.
I am one of those women this report reveals. The very month I turned 41 years of age, I was laidoff. Out of work for a full 2 years, I was able to land a few temporary gigs in the Technologies, but a permanent job never surfaced. I ended leaving the Industry in 2006 and since then have worked in Manufacturing, Finance, Education, and Retail. Earning 1/3 the rate of pay from my tech days.

I was almost sarcastic

because of the soft sided aspects of this report. I think women, especially need an objective statistical report on just how many did have their careers wiped out for that's what I suspect. Because it is a discriminatory field in the first place they were on the front lines of global labor arbitrage. I couldn't get the stats out of the report and had to go second source on this one because they want $$$$ to even read it. Supposedly it will be published in the Harvard Business review at which point maybe I can see some raw statistics and extrapolate or maybe there needs to be a much more thorough study.

But, your story, I believe you and sorry to hear it.

News Flash - Women are Equal

Weren't the "high tech" jobs like IT, electronics, semicon, medical technology, aerospace and so forth supposed to be the jobs that stayed put and replace those lost to outsourcing as promised by the globalists?

These high tech jobs are the very ones that are leaving our shores in droves, while the grunt labor jobs have been the ones that have remained relatively untouched by the race to the bottom

sure were

Also as I recall they were sold as great opportunities for women because so few women were in these fields. Instead they walked into a Neutron bomb.

We were Mislead

When manufacturing jobs were exported, High Tech jobs, we were told, would be our bread and butter. And they were, temporarily. Finance jobs became the new 'tech'. But we can see that when we put all our eggs into one basket and rely on one industry to float our economy, we are doomed. What remains is non trade service jobs - jobs that cannot be exported. Jobs like groomers, retail, cleaning services, landscaping, etc.

PG going to link up decline to H-1B

Check this out, CNET reports that the Programmer's Guild is going to connect guest worker Visas, H-1Bs behind women's decline in STEM.

They are issuing a report this week sometime linking the two. We'll have to wait to see what they come up with but it wouldn't surprise me at all there is a strong correlation. Most guest worker Visa holders in Professional areas, especially STEM are young and male.

Here comes the fireworks! Where the values of equality and diversity hit head on with the propaganda of the corporate cheap labor lobby. It's like watching a firecracker lit at both ends, I can't wait!

Way to go PG!

This should be interesting to watch

I bet that our mutual alma mater will be shitting bricks when they see this. Remember I have that database with the info about the resident/non-resident/foreign national breakdown for graduate funding.

Remember that earning a masters degree here sets a foreign national up for one of those 20,000 H1Bs not linked to a specific job.

Globalization and Academia

I think that would be one hell of a post. Not just one school (which please let's remain nameless for a moment), but on an aggregate. So many of them are opening up campuses in Dubai, China, India, changing the acceptance requirements for graduate school extensively and undergrad as well. Getting a statistical aggregate of graduate stipends/funding based on resident/non/international could be quite damning and very telling for public state and federally funded higher education institutions chartered with providing high quality education first and foremost to the residents of the locale where they exist.

Anonymous bits in cyberspace do get picked up, believe me, on here they are.

What would be very nice

would be if a member of Congress could write to schools receiving federal research funds asking for the disclosure of that information.

I think that the extent to which foreign nationals are favored over Americans would shock people.

well

There are certainly a lot of Congress representatives who just might be willing to do that if asked.

Personally, I don't think universities will be so willing or quick to give it up. I'm wondering if those statistics are available through some sort of public disclosure.

Bernie Sanders

and Sherrod Brown spring to mind.

And as for the willingness of universities to cough up the numbers, I imagine that legislation to make their release a condition of receiving federal research dollars would go a long way towards chaging their mind.

call 'em up

I'm serious. Plain call 'em up, start with your state Congressional members, tell 'em you want them to look into something, make a whine about it. You never know.

My overall impression is while the House Science Committee does try to at least hold some hearings on Academia, for the most part, there is not much spot light on what they are doing.

Sanders, rocks. But believe it or not, I'll bet there are also some conservative Republicans who would be interested in this one as well. Grassley(R-IA) for one.

China Industrial Espionage

This is somewhat relevant. A little over the top, but it's basically accurate (let's go liquor up some big star Prof to get him to explain these labor participation graphs! heh, heh, heh!)

STEM

please forgive my ignorance

I assume STEM stands for science technology engineering math?

Definitions, STEM, S&T

These are terms used by NSF (National Science Foundation), BLS (Bureau of Labor and Statistics), GAO (Government Accountability Office) and so on. I think language is going to 3, 4 letter mnemonics generally these days!

STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics. So, this is a broad occupational area (jobs) that can include IT to advanced cutting edge research.

S&T is another common use and that stands for Science and Technology.

Chicks Calculate not Cackle

Surprise, surprise, girls are equal to boys in Mathematics aptitude.

Advanced
Math study finds girls are just as good as boys
.