NY women see earnings lag, more poverty

A report released on Thursday assessing women's economic status in New York gave the state a C (+) overall but raised concerns about an increase in poverty rates among women, stagnant wages and a growing income gap between rich and poor that the report called the worst in the nation, according to Newsday.

The report showcases a "tale of two New York states: one of great opportunity and one of deep disadvantage", said Heidi Hartmann, president of the Institute for Women's Policy Research.

The report was commissioned by the New York Women's Foundation and conducted by the Institute for Women's Policy Research, based in Washington. It found that New York scored well in women's employment in managerial and professional jobs, ranking ninth among all states, and in women's earnings, ranking 13th, and in the percentage of women-owned businesses, ranking eighth.

Yet the report found the median earnings for New York women in 2005 had stagnated and, at US$33,300 (Bt1.1 million), were $100 lower than in 1989.

The median earnings for African-American women ($33,800), Hispanic women ($31,800) and American Indian women ($29,000) were considerably lower than Asian-American women ($39,200), and white women ($39,700) - an example, the report said, of persistent racial disparities.

Gina Hill Slater Parker, president of Black Women Enterprises in Hempstead, a non-profit group of women business-owners, said this was not surprising. "Nothing has happened that has been groundbreaking to change that outcome," she said.

Overall, New York State women earned 78.4 per cent of what men earned.

The report also found that poverty among New York women had risen since 1989, when the percentage of women living above the poverty line was 87.2 per cent. By 2005, the report found the percentage above poverty had dropped to 84.8 per cent, ranking the state 40th.