What Do Women Want... in 2008?

By Michael Riccards and Mary Gatta

About a century ago, psychologist Sigmund Freud asked, “What do women want?” He never satisfactorily answered that question. Now as the United States approaches the 2008 presidential election, the Center for Women and Work at Rutgers University and the Hall Institute of Public Policy are attempting to determine women’s priorities for the nation’s next chief executive. To do so, we conducted a presidential forum at Rutgers with a panel comprised of women leaders from New Jersey's business, academic and media industries.

The session was part of a series of forums that the Hall Institute has been conducting throughout the state to identify the issues of greatest importance to New Jerseyans for the next president. To date, the war in Iraq, the need for universal medical coverage and immigration reform have emerged as the state’s top priorities.

At our women’s forum, panelists and audience members overwhelmingly stressed the persistent and growing anxiety over economic security. With rising unemployment, rollbacks of pension funds and the contraction of medical benefits, middle class and blue collar New Jerseyans have been affected by downturns in the economy, especially for women heading up families. One out of five working women live at or below the poverty level, and over 55 percent of women provide half or more of their family’s income.

Although there is a modest family leave policy in place in the United States, there was some concern that even this unpaid leave policy may be reversed by executive order at the end of this Administration. The current Department of Labor was also seen as showing little commitment to workers’ rights. Especially significant is the need for more money for worker training and development. Working women need the opportunity to move up the ladder of opportunity in order to earn more income and achieve some greater job security. Nearly all women are a part of the American workforce at some point in their lifetime, so what happens in the world of work is of critical importance to them and to their children.

In an advanced economy such as ours, the acquisition and updating of skills is one of the surest avenues for fighting poverty and unemployment. But college and university tuitions have escalated and Pell money (federal need based financial aid) has not kept pace As a result, the important track of social mobility is being closed off to large numbers of working women who want to go on to college. In this country income, health benefits, pension rights, home ownership all are linked. And in order to understand the standard of living in which people operate, there is a real imperative to examine different methodologies so one can appreciate the true costs of living in a particular area of the country. For example, New Jersey is an especially expensive in terms of housing and taxes. A simple definition of the “poverty level” is not useful for understanding what people need to survive.

Women have been and are the main caregivers of their families. Unlike Western European countries, we do not take into account those realities and additional burdens and responsibilities, usually borne by women. Many of these nations provide PAID family leave for fairly long periods of time. Providing some recognition of those burdens is a real definition of family values -- respect for providing support for caregivers.

Comments at the forum repeatedly stressed the traumas of economic insecurity and their destabilizing effects on our society. It is necessary to resurrect the American notion of community, of recognizing the common good that unites us. The forum’s speakers and its guests wanted the next president to hear clearly the need for more support for working women and their dependents. The costs of a prolonged war are diverting enormous resources away from our social problems. Working women need a re-ordering of national priorities and changes that allow them to accentuate collective efforts, organizing and national forbearance.

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The Hall Institute of Public Policy - New Jersey is a non-partisan, not-for-profit organization that explores issues of social, economic, educational and cultural importance to the Garden State. For more information, visit the Hall Institute online at http://www.hallnj.org/ or email info@hallnj.org.