Women in 2019: Have We Overcome?

I love this picture of Gloria Steinem, which was taken at a rally in 1965—a time of great social activism that didn’t start but absolutely accelerated the feminist movement. She was then and still is one of the faces of the fight for gender equality. Gloria and her tribe didn’t just march and rant back then: they listened, built awareness, debated solutions, and changed a lot of people’s expectations about women’s status in our society. Eventually their collective efforts resulted in legislation like the Equal Pay Act of 1963 and Title 9—legislation passed in 1972 that prohibits sex discrimination in education.

Things were different then. Women earned 35% of the college degrees, made $0.59 on the dollar to men, and were only 35% of the US workforce. Fifty-two years after this photo was taken and amidst our own wave of feminist activism like the Women’s March, #metoo, and #timesup ⇒ things are getting better now, right?

On International Women’s Day, March 8, 2019, I found myself wondering how much progress has been made toward achieving gender equality in the last 50 years. Here’s what I learned.

Education:

When it comes to education, the answer is ‘hell yes’, we practically flipped the gap. According to the US Department of Education, women achieved parity in higher education in 1981.

Today women earn 57% of bachelors, masters, and doctoral degrees.

This fact is proof that we can solve problems when we focus and work together toward a common goal.

Employment:

Today, and for the last 36 years, women gained skills and education to prepare them for the workforce by earning more college degrees. So we must have achieved parity in the workforce too then, right?

LeanIn.org reports that today’s entry level workforce is pretty even 48% of entry level workers are women. Gender parity that was facilitated by increasing numbers of college-educated women, starting in the 80’s. But we haven't made the same progress in the C-suite: women hold only 23% of c-suite and senior executive roles and only 22% of board seats at the Fortune 1000.

48% of entry level workers are women, but women hold only 23% of the C-suite and senior executive roles.

These stats show that women are competitive today when it comes to landing our first job, but we aren’t making our way up the corporate ladder into leadership positions at the same rate. This fact wasn’t a surprise to me, but it’s a great motivator. It reminds me that 25 years into my career it’s important for me to stay ambitious and continue advocating for my own career advancement. My ability to ask for and receive promotions is just as important as hiring and developing young talent. Because making my way into senior leadership and the C-suite will help pave the way for the next generation of great female leaders.

Earnings:

If women are closing the employment gap, then you'd think we're making more money now too. In 2019, the truth about female earning potential is mixed.

As the female workforce has grown, the wage gap has improved. On average, women now make $0.79 on the dollar (compared to $0.65 in 1965). That shows progress, but it’s not the whole picture. Minority women don’t fare as well and long term earnings are still way behind. The Institute for women’s policy research found that women earn half as much as men over a 15-year period.

Women make $0.79 on every dollar today but earn only half as much as men over a 15-year period.

There are lots of theories why. The two most common are that women receive fewer promotions and subsequent raises. They also leave the workforce at higher rates to raise kids and care for sick family members. Until we get serious about solving those two issues, our earning potential will continue to lag behind men.

A Matter of Fairness or Profit?

We’ve clearly come a long way, but women still have work to do to even the score. As a business leader, my passion for empowering women isn’t about fairness or social justice. As I tell my 3 kids everyday, life isn’t fair. I care about this because mountains of research to prove that well-balanced, diverse teams perform better. McKinsey’s Delivering Through Diversity report published last year proved that gender equality has a direct impact on a company’s performance. They examined profitability and value creation at 1,000 companies from 12 countries and found that

Companies with more gender diversity are 21% more likely to make more money.

There are also plenty of examples of companies that benefit from going ‘all-in’ on this issue. One of my favorites comes from the world’s greatest SaaS business, Salesforce.com. Over the last 3 years, CEO Marc Benioff has put his money where is mouth is on equal pay. A passionate and vocal champion of equality, he’s approved $8.7M in salary adjustments over the last 3 years to ensure that the men and women who work for him are paid equal money for equal work.

Salesforce has retained its dominance over the CRM space in that time, and it’s stock has more than tripled since 2015. Holding themselves accountable to their commitment to gender equality isn’t the only reason for their financial success, but it’s a big one.

How Much Further?

My last insight is a rally cry. We need to pick up the pace. The World Economic Forum publishes an annual report that measures the global gender gap in 4 ways: education, economic opportunity, health, and political empowerment. The report estimates that if progress continues at current rates of change, the world won’t achieve gender equality for another 108 years. And North America is expected to take even longer—165 years.

Can we wait 165 years to close the gender gap in the US?? No, of course we can’t. I’m not a whiner and I don’t believe in the blame game. I think the best way to solve problems is to measure them, explore the causes, and then get to work fixing them. I’m feel encouraged by all the progress of the last 50 years. It makes me believe that it’s only a matter of time before men and women are educated equally, hired equally, promoted equally and have the same earning potential as men. The question I’m asking myself today is what’s it going to take to speed things up?

I’m leading a panel at #SXSW this year that will take a generational approach to answering that question. Please join me, Gay Gaddis, Sara Hirsh Bordo, and Rachel Jamail on Tuesday, March 12 for Return on Inclusion: 3 Generations of Women at Work. We want and need to hear your thoughts and ideas for how our businesses can pick up the pace on empowering women at work.