young women

Crossposted from the EMILY's List Blog.

The State of Young America tells us that the issues plaguing young Americans aren't just bad. They're abysmal. The research project released by DEMOS, details a frightening glimpse into the lives of 18-34 year olds trying to start a life and start a family, particularly young women.

One discouraging fact from the data (page 53): just 11% of all workers had access to paid family leave. When it comes to young women and young families having their first child, a lack of paid family leave can be devastating, and leave new parents no choice but to get back to work right away. Not surprisingly, access to paid family leave depends on job level. If you’ve got the swanky Wall Street job you probably have a greater chance of having paid family leave (17%), where lower wage earners, like those at entry level jobs had a heck of a lot less possibility of paid family leave (5%).

When it comes to child care, you're looking at one of the largest expenses a family often has. Moms already know this, but according to the data, "center-based child care fees for two children (an infant and a 4-year-old) exceeded annual median rent payments in every state" (page 55). And this isn’t just in places like New York City – child care costs for 2 children is more than average rent in all 50 states.

One young mom said, "the lack of affordable child care in California is the main reason my husband had to quit his well-paying full time job. The monthly rate of $900 a month per child for each of our 4 kids exceeded his take home pay. We decided that it didn't make sense for us both to work." More and more children are being cared for by ad-hoc child care arrangements, grandparents or other relatives, or stay at home dads.

We've seen the President take an important step to help many young working Americans, and we must focus on helping young women and families. High child care costs, low wages, and no paid family leave, are all issues women have had for generations. And in a tough economy they don't get better; they get worse.

This was on SNL last week and it gets funnier every time I see it, but I keep seeing those Brink Home Security commercials and I concur they really do play on this unrealistic fear that all men want to come into your home and kill you if you're young and single.

Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) introduced legislation yesterday calling for a long-term official Commission on Women. While this might be similar to the President's announcement about his White House council on women and girls, the Commission on Women would be a constant council that would outlast any White House administration.

In a recent Politico piece

"some women said the interagency council Obama announced March 11 fell short of the full-time office or Cabinet-level influence they had hoped for. Mason offered no criticism of Obama's action, but said it spurred more calls for a broad-ranging national panel."

The Commission would be apprised of a 15 member group including four appointed by the President, three by the Speaker of the House, two by the Minority Leader in the House, three by the Majority Leader of the Senate, and two by the Minority Leader of the Senate. Other woman working on the President's Council on Women and girls would serve in an advisory capacity and liaise between the two.

Most notably is the mention in the bill that the Commission would mandate at least one member be between 18 and 24 to ensure there is a youth perspective. Each member would serve a term of 5 years on the Commission and represent a diverse background regionally, generational, racially, economically, and from various industries as a means of representing a wide range of women's issues and problems facing women.

Another commitment would be that the Commission is dedicated to grassroots outreach, and allowing all women to have a voice in advocating to the Commission and the members doing outreach themselves to ensure a broad group of women are being heard.

Rep. Speier's Communications Director relayed a story she told him of her own first elected position in the 1980's on the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors. There she held a hearing on the area's women in poverty and at that time, he said, women were the face of poverty. It developed in Speier a desire to work for women's issues across the board not merely at the county level but then at the state level as well. Her commitment to women continues through this legislation as well.

The Commission is part of a project of the national organization Women Count who has partnered with 55 other organizations across the country to encourage other members of Congress and the Senate to approve if not co-sponsor the legislation.

Women Count says the Commission is necessary in large part because

"as the economy became the single most critical issue in the election, the role that women play in our economic structure has never been clearer. Women are the backbone of the nation’s workforce and control 70 percent of its buying power."

Speier continues in the Politico piece

"If you look at statistics, it’s very telling. Women represent only 17 percent of Congress. The amount women make in comparison to men is only 77 cents on the dollar. ... It’s that kind of insidious discrimination that lingers.

They announced the bill Thursday because it was the anniversary of the swearing-in of Rep. Jeanette Rankin of Montana in 1917 - the first women to ever serve in Congress.

I'm pleasantly surprised by the call for at least one young woman to be on the Commission. I commend Women Count in addition to Rep. Speier for their thoughtful and youth friendly approach to solving the problems unique to the women's community and young women specifically.

I don't usually wear my feminist hat on here at FM, but March 8th is International Women's Day. Events actually occur throughout March to mark the economic, political and social achievements of women while also looking at ways we can move forward to protect women around the world who are still facing oppression.

Each year there is a different theme that countries and organizations choose that focuses on the progress and the hope for progress. This year the United Nations has chosen as their theme: Women and men united to end violence against women and girls.

Another more local group has also chose this as a theme: The state of Kansas. But more importantly Governor Kathleen Sebelius has signed a proclamation recognizing it as "Jana Mackey Day in Kansas."

This isn't something I talk a lot about, because it was such a difficult time, but last year in the throws of the campaign season one of my dearest friends was murdered by her ex-boyfriend. She had dedicated her life to fighting for women, women's issues, equality, and against domestic violence.

We'd worked together on campaigns for good EMILY's List endorsed candidates and Jana went even further when she worked as Lobbyist for the National Organization for Women, working behind the scenes to pass more comprehensive sex education in Kansas - which we lovingly referred to as Abstinence Plus.

After her death, family and friends established a national campaign to help Jana's service live on through others. Symbolic of the number of people who attended her funeral, the Eleven Hundred Torches campaign urges hundreds of ordinary citizens to serve others. They've encouraged us to inspire others to work in our communities and use this day to not only honor women but to help develop stronger citizens everywhere.

Governor Sebelius has joined the campaign and is calling on all Kansans to set aside time on March 8th to volunteer in their communities - I'm asking that we all use this day everywhere, inspired by our mothers, our grandmothers, our wives, our sisters, daughters, and our friends to build a better world.

Important and quick facts on young women and violence from the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence:

• 61% of female homicide victims were wives or intimate acquaintances of their killers.
• 10% of female homicide victims are less than 18 years old and only 9% are over 65.
• The average age of a female homicide victim is 36.
• More than 8 times as many African American women were murdered by a male they knew than were killed by strangers.

According to a US News and World Report Wednesday young voters are one of the five voting groups to watch this election cycle.

"The only problem is that voting—or failing to vote—has always been the issue when it comes to youth. Since 1972, the first election in which 18-to-20-year-olds were eligible to vote, turnout among the under-30 crowd has steadily declined. In 2004, this trend seemed to turn around as the number of young voters increased. Get-out-the-vote organizations touted the fact that there were 4.2 million more voters under 30 than there were in 2000.

This year, there's perhaps even more hype surrounding the youth vote, and it could actually be warranted. Primary turnout among young people doubled, tripled, and even quadrupled in many states, compared with primaries in 2000 and 2004, according to Rock the Vote, a youth-oriented voter registration group that often partners with entertainment companies. In some communities, more young voters are registering, and anecdotal reports suggest more young people are volunteering for the campaigns as well. "You don't write off anyone," says Matt Segal, the executive director of SAVE, who encourages both of the candidates to ramp up their efforts to attract the youth vote. "Young voters are susceptible to the politicians who reach out to them." A swing state like Wisconsin might go to Obama if young people turn out in large numbers, as some suggest they will. If they're right, that really would be a change."

Other groups, not surprisingly include women, African Americans, Hispanics, and Evangelicals. All groups we like to talk about here on FM because all of them can also fall within the group of young people.

Women are always targets, call them soccer moms, security moms, or the recent revelation about single women, women are more than half of the population. A good friend said it best, "Piss off a man, he just ain't gonna vote for you. But you piss off a women not only is she not gonna vote for ya, her husband ain't, her kids ain't, her friends ain't, and everyone at the beauty shop sure as hell ain't. Women are powerful."

Ok, antidotes aside, African Americans are energized by issues and certainly by the fact that the first African American in the general election is on the ballot. AA's also more inclined to be younger.

Average age of Latinos is also younger and there is a pretty good broadband penetration rate for their demographic.

Evangelicals, tend to be older, of course, but young evangelicals are a voting bloc as we've seen that tend to be more interested in Obama's message. His campaign is ready to go after them, and while the whole of the demographic might not go for him, young evangelicals might.

So, of these 5 demographics I think its fair to say that 4 of the 5 include young people or include youth elements to them. And with young evangelicals I'd say that makes up 4.5 of the top 5 voting groups to watch that have a youth component to them.