A recent report from the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace, and Security provides an overview of women’s wellbeing in the U.S.
The Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace, and Security is one of the world’s leading research institutes for gender equality and women’s wellbeing. One of their most important contributions to this work has been the creation of large datasets and indexes which map out what places in the world are the best, and worst to be a woman based off many factors.
Recently they created an index about women’s wellbeing within the U.S., giving us an important, and data rich overview about gender equality in the U.S., and how this differs from state to state. There are 12 main indicators this is based off including: employment levels, representation in government, access to health care, experiences of violence, and more as well.
This is a report that is certainly worth looking through yourself, but here are some interesting highlights and insights from the report.
Wellbeing of women varies tremendously from state to state, where some states offer many protections and services for women, while others offer none. Massachusetts ranks as the best state to be a woman in the U.S, while Louisiana comes in last.
Only 34% of people surveyed said it was a good time to be a woman in America. This decreased down to 25% when asked if it was a good time to be a black woman in America.
One of the most important things this report does is that it provides disaggregated data by race so that we are able to see how women’s wellbeing in states is impacted by race. For instance, in New Jersey, a black woman is 4x as likely to die in childbirth than a white woman.
This report is a useful resource for anyone working to close the economic gender gap and provides a detailed overview of women’s wellbeing (or not) across the U.S. with key data and insights.