Public Employee Press

International Women's Day celebrated

As millions of women worldwide celebrated International Women's Day in March, with thousands demonstrating for equal rights, the City University's Murphy Institute featured DC 37 Field Services Director Barbara Edmonds (2nd from right) and SSEU Local 371 Executive Vice President Yolanda Pumarejo (right) in its March 7 program honoring women in the workforce and in their unions.

Edmonds showed that despite the huge social, political and economic gains women have made in recent years, tremendous inequality remains. She pointed out that women are now 45 percent of the U.S. workforce, will be a majority by 2023, and are 58 percent of New York City's municipal employees - but most occupational groups dominated by women have lower median pay than groups that are mainly men. Pumarejo charged that since women constitute a majority of the users of government social services, attacks on public services discriminate against women.