DOC. L 36.114 3: T 91/973 U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR EMPLOYMENT STANDARDS ADMINISTRATION Women’s Bureau WASHINGTON, O.C. 20210 TWENTY FACTS ON WOMEN WORKERS 1. Nine out of ten girls will work at some time in their lives# 2# Most women work because of economic need# Nearly two-thirds of all women workers are single, divorced, widowed, or separated, or have husbands whose earnings are less than $7,000 a year# 3# More than 33 million women are in the labor force; they constitute nearly two-fifths of all workers# Some 4 million women of minority races are in the labor force; they constitute more than two-fifths of all minority workers. 4. Half of all women 18 to 64 years of age are workers. 5. About one-fourth of, all women workers hold part-time jobs. 6. Women accounted for three-fifths of the increase in the civilian labor force in the last decade. 7. Labor force participation is highest among women 18 to 24 and 35 to 5b years of age; the median age of women workers is 38 years. 8. The more education a woman has, the greater the likelihood she will seek paid employment. Nearly 7 out of 10 women 45 to 54 years of age with 4 or more years of college axe in the labor force. 9• The number of working mothers (women with children under 18) has increased more than eightfold since 1940. They now number 12.7 million, an increase of 3*9 million in the last decade. 10. The 4#4 million working mothers with children under 6 in 1972 had 5.6 million children under 6; the estimated number of licensed day care slots is 905,000. 11. Women workers are concentrated in low-paying dead end jobs. As a result, the average woman worker earns about three-fifths of what a man does, even when both work full time year round. 12 . UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS-URBAN A 3 0112 099060987 Unemployment was lowest for white adult males (3.6 percent) and highest for minority teenage girls (33.6 percent) in 1972. White adult women Minority adult men Minority adult women White teenage boys White teenage girls Minority teenage boys 4.9 percent 6.8 percent 8.8 percent 14.2 percent 14.2 percent 29.8 percent 13. About 1 out of 9 families is headed by a woman; almost 2 out of 5 poor families are headed by a woman. About 3 out of 10 black families are headed by a woman; almost 3 out of 5 poor black families are headed by a woman. . 14. It is frequently the w;.fe f s earnings which raise a family out of poverty.* In husband-wife families 13 percent have incomes below $4,000 if the wife does not work; 4 percent when she does work. 15. 0^ the workers not covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act (FIfiA), 40 percent are women. Fifty-seven percent of all black women workers are not covered by FL3A; the comparable percentage for white women is 22 percent. 16. The average woman worker is as well educated as the average man worker. Both women and men have completed a median of 12.4 years of schooling. t # • 17. Women are about two-fifths of all professional and technical workers but only about one-sixth of all nonfarm managers and administrators. 18. Women are 76 percent of all clerical workers but only 4 percent of all craftsmen and foremen. 19. The median wage of full-time year-round private household workers was $ 1,981 in 1971. Private household workers are protected by minimum wage legislation in only four States. They are protected by virtually no other legislation. 20. Fully employed women high school graduates (with no college) have less income on the average than fully employed men who have not completed elementary school. ^Classified as poor were those nonfarm families of four with total income of less than $4,100 in 1971. Source: U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census; U.S. Department oP Health, Education, and Welfare, National Center for Social Statistics; U.S, Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics and Wage and Hour Division, Employment Standards Administration. February 1973 -2-