Women`s Inequality in the workplace

Latina women earn 51 cents per dollar . The study included executives and

frontline workers . Women overall made significant progress in terms of promotions in 2002 but

minority women saw few gains , according to Catalyst , the New York women 's research group . It

reported that nearly 16 percent of officers at Fortune 500 firms were women , up from 12 .5

percent in 2000 . When the group looked at minority women , however , it found only 1 .5 percent

were corporate officers in 2002 , up from 1 .3 percent in 2000 (Lewis

2004

Pay inequity hurts women and their families and robs them of hundreds of thousands of

dollars in income and retirement over their lifetime . Eliminating this inequity is nothing short of

a national priority (Schakowsky , 2000 ) Nationally , women earn 75 cents for every dollar that

men earn . African American women earn 65 cents for every dollar a man earns . And Latina

women earn only 58 cents for every dollar that a man earns . In Illinois , women earn 72 cents for

every dollar that a man earns . Women of color earn 62 cents for every dollar earned by men

A working woman 's family loses on average 4000 each year due to this inequity . And in

Illinois , women lose on average 4 ,913 a year . The inequity compounds over the years . A 25-

year-old working woman will lose 523 ,000 during her lifetime as a result of this wage gap

And when she retires , she will collect a smaller pension and less Social Security (Schakowsky

2000

According to Dr . Audrey Murrel , wage inequity is still a significant problem within our

economy . Murrel believes that women are still underrepresented in key leadership positions

across all types of organizations and industries . Even within comparable positions , the gap in pay

persists and gets wider as...