Women's Job Growth Halts in January; Men Have Regained 81 Percent of Jobs Lost in the Recession

WASHINGTON, Feb. 7, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- According to an Institute for Women's Policy Research (IWPR) analysis of the February employment report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), women lost 51,000 jobs on nonfarm payrolls in January, while men gained 164,000 for a net increase of 113,000 jobs. As of January, women have more than recovered all their jobs lost in the recession, while men have regained 81 percent (4.9 million) of the jobs they lost.

In January, women's employment growth was weakest in Government (30,000 jobs lost by women) and Professional and Business Services (14,000 jobs lost by women). In what had been a growing sector for women, Education and Health Services saw women's job losses for a second consecutive month (3,000 jobs lost for women in January and 2,000 in December).

"Women's job growth over the last 18 months had buoyed the slow, but steady, growth of the economy," said IWPR President Heidi Hartmann, Ph.D. "Men's job gains in January are an encouraging sign of a recovering economy, but both men and women need to see stronger job growth in order to get family incomes growing again."

The February employment report includes annual benchmarking revisions to the payroll data back to January 2009. According to these latest estimates, women held more than half of the jobs on payrolls for a ten month period, from the official end of the recession in June 2009 through March 2010. In the last year, from January 2013 to January 2014, of the 2.2 million jobs added to payrolls, 46 percent were filled by women (1,038,000 jobs), and 54 percent were filled by men (1,200,000 jobs).

Among single mothers, the unemployment rate increased from 8.7 percent in December to 9.1 percent in January, indicating continued difficulty for these women in finding jobs. There has been no improvement over the past year in the average number of weeks spent unemployed and looking for work, which was 35.4 weeks in both January 2013 and January 2014.

The Institute for Women's Policy Research (IWPR) is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization that conducts rigorous research and disseminates its findings to address the needs of women and their families, promote public dialogue, and strengthen communities and societies.

SOURCE Institute for Women's Policy Research