Her New Normal

Maria Reitan
Senior Principal
7/2/2012
 

Do you remember 2006? I find it challenging to reach that far back into my memory bank. Granted, I had a toddler at the time. That’s probably one reason why I recall so little. But it should have been a good year. It was the last one before the official big slide. You know the one — the start of the financial and economic recession that made itself more apparent the following year and then really kicked into gear in 2008.

The recession hit men so hard it was called a “Mancession.” Fast forward three years and more men than women were getting jobs. In fact, women were losing them to the tune of 218,000 jobs, increasing their unemployment rate by 0.2 percentage points to 8.5 percent between June 2009 and May 2011. Men, on the other hand, saw their unemployment rate improve by 1.1 percentage points to 9.5 percent. That’s a gain of around 768,000 jobs over the same time period.¹

Experts who are in the know say it’s because companies in traditional male-dominated industries are now bouncing back and starting to hire. But that doesn’t explain why women are losing jobs. It just paints a picture as to why men are getting them.

Yes, things have looked up for women in the workforce. We’ve closed the payroll gap from 35 percent in 1970 to 34 percent in 2008, but we have a long way to go. And it’s stressing us out. ²

Lets be honest, lots of things are stressing us out. Money, housing costs, job stability and health. In fact, women more than men rank these things as big stressors.³

Ironically, while the topic of health stresses us, it’s our health that’s at risk.

“Stress over money and the economy is taking an emotional and physical toll on America, especially among women,” said psychologist Katherine Nordal, Ph.D. “If Americans continue to experience these high levels of stress for prolonged periods of time, they are at risk for developing serious illnesses.”

So, we here at Carmichael Lynch Spong and our sister agency Carmichael Lynch wondered, how are women copying with what has essentially become their new normal?        

We set out to find out. You’ll be able to read the results for yourself in subsequent articles right here on this site. You may find a bit of yourself in the findings. I know I did.

¹ Pew Research Center Analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics
² New York Times, Economix Blog, October 2009
³ American Psychological Association, 2008