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| More than 200 years after the Declaration of Independence, women are so financially stretched they would rather work a second job than get time off. |
Tomorrow we celebrate the day when America’s founders declared all men are created equal. How fitting we should focus on the equality of men. Because when it comes to pay, women still haven’t achieved equality in this nation, despite the more than 200 years that have gone by since the Declaration of Independence.
So no matter how stressed they are on the job, and how much they ache to spend more time with their families, when asked what they need most, working women today say they need a raise, not more time off from work.
In fact, according to the 2008 Ask a Working Woman survey, women say if they had more available time, the first thing they’d do—before spending time with friends and family, exercising, taking a class or getting more sleep—is work another job.
Work another job!
That’s how low the Bush economy has sunk, and how financially strapped working families have become.
In the survey, which I first noted at FDL here, more than half of the 12,000 respondents say a 10 percent raise tops affordable, high-quality health care or child care as making working women’s lives easier. Results of the survey, sponsored by the AFL-CIO and our community affiliate, Working America, were released June 25.
In addition to the stinking Bush economy, the survey reflects the fact that women today still are paid only 77 cents to the dollar of what men are paid—and that sinks to 72 cents for African American women and 60 cents for Latinas. On average, a 25-year-old working woman will lose more than $523,000 to unequal pay during her working life.
On the eve of Fourth of July, 2008, Kelly, a 2008 Ask a Working Woman respondent, speaks for many of America’s women when she says:
I have to choose everyday if I am going to buy food or gas to get work. Gas always wins, because I need my paycheck to support my family. I never have enough money, ever.
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Jus Cogens!
Happy Independence Day!
Google must divulge YouTube log
Google must divulge the viewing habits of every user who has ever watched any video on YouTube, a US court has ruled.
The ruling comes as part of Google’s legal battle with Viacom over allegations of copyright infringement.
Digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) called the ruling a “set-back to privacy rights”.
No shit…
I posted this in the last thread but it is actually kind of apropos here.
In the 90 months since Bush took office in January 2001, the Bush economy has created 5.17 million jobs or 57,450 a month. (These figures are based on the June 2008 job number which is preliminary and are of seasonally adjusted non-farm jobs).
http://www.bls.gov/webapps/legacy/cesbtab1.htm (You have to set the form yourself.)
Stealing from my scandals entry 298 here, by contrast in the 8 years of the Clinton Administration (from January 1993 to December 2000), 22,760,000 nonfarm jobs were created or ~237,000/month (more than 4 times the Bush rate).
During the Bush years, manufacturing jobs traditionally associated with jobs with good wages and benefits declined by 3,577,000 from 17,114,000 in January 2001 to 13,537,000 (est.) in June 2008. The Clinton Administration actually saw a modest increase of 385,000.
So just to recap, in 8 years Bill Clinton created nearly 23 million jobs. In 7 1/2 years Bush has managed to create just over 5 million. Crude oil is trading at $144/bbl this morning. Everyone knows about gas prices. Everyone knows about the housing market going into the toilet. But the biggest stealth economic issue that almost no one has paid attention to is the horrendously crappy job Bush has done in creating jobs during his Administration.
Boy! I know THIS story by heart! I NEVER had enough money when I was raising my daughter by myself. NEVER. I remember those days like they were yesterday and I so feel for working moms everywhere in today’s economy.
So, what’s that Pilgrim doll doing with the native baby???@!!!!
The Pilgrim mommy had a little fling—looks happy.
Hillary was pushing for programs that would result in higher pay for women. Will Obama pick them up?
At 8:40 on this video, a woman tells Shrub that she works three jobs. Shrub says, that’s fantastic! Uniquely American.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcLHtLLZ94g
And, let’s not forget the effect over the past 15-20 years of employers increasing their payrolling of workers through temporary agencies rather than hiring them outright. “In 2001, …nearly 60% of temporary services workers were women..blacks and Hispanics accounted for 25 and 18%, respectively, of temporary agency employees.”
http://www.irp.wisc.edu/public…..oc231a.pdf
$523K! That is stunning, what a hammer to use on any women who think the new conservative leaning Supreme Court is so fabulous. Good information after the boneheaded Lilly Ledbetter ruling. I guess W would think that woman trying to have another job in her spare time, if she had some, would be the quintessential American yearning for something better, the good ol’ go gittum mentality. He likes that and thinks it a good thing to see that sort of work ethic in a
peasantcitizen.What that dosn’t say is that the manufacturing jobs still here are paying less. Alot. And the benefits are shrinking as well. Add to that increases in contributions for dependent health insurance and you have a perfect storm for devestating the manufacturing base.
Thanks for the wonderful post,Tula.
well, brit hume and ferd barnes and that guy in the wheelchair said everything’s OK and the media is just being hysterical about the economy. and I’ll take that to the bank. if I ever have any reason to go to one again.
probably. it’ll help him get elected.
Crude may be trading at $144/bbl, and this may have much to do with it: Since Bush took office, the real dollar’s had a 41 percent drop against the euro. Anyone had a 41% raise since January 2001? We are doomed if McCain takes office as Bush III.
More and more of the big Tech employers actually have a Temp Agency Rep ensconced in an office on site. I’ve seen at several over the years. It is admittedly much more common now, they can eliminate all those annoying benefits and such.
great point. alll kindsa crap happening that doesn’t show up in te bigger stats. like, as you mention, highre contributions for health insurance. when people get laid off the remaining people have to do their jobs, for the same, sometimes less, pay…. and on it goes.
Yeah that’s it. It’s not that people can barely afford to drive to work or pay for daycare. It can’t possibly be that millions of Americans are losing their homes. It sure as hell isn’t the fact that people are cutting back on food because of rising prices. And the elderly are having to choose between food or meds. I’m positive it has nothing to do with any of that. We are all so stupid that some bobble head on teevee telling us how much money we have is having disasterous effects on the economy. Nothing more, nothing less.
One of the major issues that I see is that ‘temping’ really used to be that – short term. Now, even with the Microsoft ‘permatemp’ case, companies just use long term temps. And in many areas, if you want a job with a specific employer(because of your skill set or because of the working conditions or whatever), you don’t have any choice because many times, those companies do not hire people any more – even if you are exactly what they want, they will payroll you through the agency. As far as I’m concerned, this is not only bad for the business(creates different classes or workers) but it is also against the law.
This can benefit SOME employees as well- turning em into “contractors” and turning the lost benefits into higher pay enables em to deduct more expenses and often to simply take on benefits from a working spouse.
Yes but since oil was trading at $32/bbl when Bush came into office, a 41% increase would mean it should be trading at just over $45/bbl today. I wrote a long entry at 365 I believe in my scandals list on this if you are interested.
Assuming you have such a thing…
Yes- which is why I said “some” employees.
But, but, but… How can that be? Don’t we still have lots of people building burgers? (I have a looooong memory!)
But, but, but… How can that be? Don’t we still have lots of people building burgers? (I have a looooong memory!)
Must be the media just being hysterical again.
Digg it!
http://digg.com/business_finan…..Me_a_Raise
That’s quite true. The results from these many years of Republic rule should be the end of that Party. Somehow it won’t and I just don’t understand why.
LOL. I guess they would have classified these as high tech manufacturing jobs if you had wanted mayo and a pickle.
dugg
That’s just manufacturing. It doesn’t become high tech unless the toaster is used.
Bottomline is that no matter who is in office 150,000+ jobs must be created EACH month just to keep up with the growth of population entering workforce.
Another law benefiting the ‘bottom’ that is not enforced:
http://www.eeoc.gov/policy/epa.html
1963 !!!!
It helps when you have someone in office who is at least concerned with those just entering the workforce, and not those who already have more than they could possibly spend in three lifetimes.
Yes, it has been very frustrating to hear market analysts, pundits, and talking heads try to talk up bad job numbers by saying they could have been worse, or that low job growth has become “natural”.
Maybe not — remember how thrilled McMoron was to discover that there were LOTS of people making a living by peddling stuff on e-bay? Feh.
this is really good news for the republicans.
low job growth + more people looking for work = cheap labor = high profits.
wonderful.
Nah, it’s high tech to push the buttons to set the fryer correctly…
New Jane upstairs on whipping that FISA
Jane is upstairs with FISA Goodness!
Qualcomm is one of those ‘big’ companies; you know, the supplier of chips/Intellectual property for cellphones?
One of my favorite songs has the lyric ‘I don’t mind stealing bread from the mouths of decadents’.