Back in the fall, I wrote about the myth that black workers were overly dependent on government jobs and suffering because of widespread public sector downsizing. As I pointed out at the time, more than four out of five black workers in fact was employed by the private sector, and their fate was tied to the recovery of the private economy every bit as much as white or Asian workers. Now comes another version of that myth, this time focused on women workers. It appeared over the weekend on the Sunday program This Week with George Stephanopolous courtesy of two of the show's panelists, Katrina Van Heuvel and Cokie Roberts.
Trying to argue the case that women are angry at Republicans because the party favors cutting government, Van Heuvel said, "So many of job losses for women are in the government sector," and Roberts followed up with, "when you talk about female job losses you are talking about government jobs."
As I pointed out in my piece on black government workers, there are actually good numbers from the government on private vs. public sector workers by industry, including government, broken down by gender and race, and they don't do much to support the argument advanced on the show. What the latest annual figures from the current population survey of the Bureau of Labor Statistics show is that there are 61.6 million women who are employed, and 50 million work in the private sector. Private women workers, in other words, make up more than 80 percent of all women with jobs.
Government jobs peaked in America in 2008, and since then the number of women working in government has declined by about half a million. But the number of females employed in the private sector has slumped by 1.6 million.
It's true that this has been more of a 'mancession,' as some have called it, thanks to job losses in industries like construction, where male workers dominate. Although there are about 16 percent more men working in the private sector than women, the number of positions held by men has declined by a whopping 3.3 million since the job peak in 2008.
Still, the argument that Van Heuvel and Roberts were making, that Republican candidates who favor smaller government have a women's problem because of public sector job cuts, ignores the fact that women, like men, work far more in the private sector and, if anything, are just as likely as men to be upset about the continuing lousy economic recovery in the private economy. But that wouldn't exactly be something you could blame on a Republican presidential candidate right now.
As I pointed out in my piece on black government workers, there are actually good numbers from the government on private vs. public sector workers by industry, including government, broken down by gender and race, and they don't do much to support the argument advanced on the show. What the latest annual figures from the current population survey of the Bureau of Labor Statistics show is that there are 61.6 million women who are employed, and 50 million work in the private sector. Private women workers, in other words, make up more than 80 percent of all women with jobs.
Government jobs peaked in America in 2008, and since then the number of women working in government has declined by about half a million. But the number of females employed in the private sector has slumped by 1.6 million.
It's true that this has been more of a 'mancession,' as some have called it, thanks to job losses in industries like construction, where male workers dominate. Although there are about 16 percent more men working in the private sector than women, the number of positions held by men has declined by a whopping 3.3 million since the job peak in 2008.
Still, the argument that Van Heuvel and Roberts were making, that Republican candidates who favor smaller government have a women's problem because of public sector job cuts, ignores the fact that women, like men, work far more in the private sector and, if anything, are just as likely as men to be upset about the continuing lousy economic recovery in the private economy. But that wouldn't exactly be something you could blame on a Republican presidential candidate right now.
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