Mothers are Primary Breadwinners  -- besides everything else they do! 

Are you a mother of children under 18 and also earning a paycheck?  Feeling tired, overworked, stressed?  You are not alone.  In almost half of all households with children (40%), mothers have become the primary breadwinners.  A May, 2014, study from Pew Research Center reports that mothers-of-families-with-children-at-home not only care for them as mothers always have but many more now bring in most of the "bacon".  In 1960, only 11 percent of households had a mother who was the major breadwinner.

Who are these breadwinners?  First and foremost, they are women.  What do we know about women who bring home paychecks?

For starters, we know that, for every dollar her male counterpart earns, a woman earns 77 cents.  Black women earn only 64 cents and Hispanic women, 54 cents on the dollar.

We know that two-thirds of all workers who are paid the minimum wage or less in 2013 are women, and 60 percent of full-time minimum-wage workers are women.

We know that 22 percent of minimum-wage workers are women of color compared to less than 16 percent of workers overall.

We know that more than three-quarters of women earning a minimum wage are age 20 or older, and most do not have a spouse to rely on.

So I ask myself:  How many of those mothers who are primary breadwinners, keeping their families afloat financially, earn $7.25 an hour, the current minimum wage?  If she is earning that amount, working full-time and year-round, she is bringing home $14,500 annually.  If she is earning only that amount, she is earning more than $4,000 below the poverty line for a mother with two children!

We have a problem.  This is a problem for all women working outside the home but particularly for women earning minimum wage.

Who are these women?  They prepare food and serve us in restaurants, they take our orders in fast food eateries; they wait on us in retail stores; they stock products in large chain stores; they assist and provide services in personal care; they are our building/grounds cleaning and maintenance people; they are the support for various office and administration, for healthcare and protective services, etc.

How can we help them?

1. Low-wage working women deserve a raise.  Within the last 30 years, the minimum wage has increased only three times.  If it had kept pace with inflation since 1968, it would now be almost $10.80 per hour.  The minimum for tipped employees is $2.13 which hasn't been changed in 20 years; it is one-third that of the federal minimum wage.  Not only that but restaurant servers (largest group of tipped employees) experience poverty at nearly three times the rate of the workforce as a whole.  And who makes up 70 percent of servers?  You guessed it -- women.
2. Increasing the minimum wage would boost wages for millions of working women and help close the wage gap.  If the minimum wage were increased to $10.10 per hour, it would boost her annual earnings by $5,700 to a total $20,200, and pull her family of three out of poverty.  If the minimum were gradually increased to $10.10 per hour by 2016, almost 30 million workers would receive a raise.  Of those almost-30 million workers, over 7 million are parents.  That includes almost 5 million working mothers which is 22 percent of all working mothers with children under 18.  Since the majority of minimum-wage earners are women, increasing the minimum wage could close the wage gap by 5 percent. 
3. Raising the minimum wage would strengthen the economy.  Raising the minimum wage lowers turnover, boosts worker efforts, and encourages employers to invest in their workers.  Most of these workers need the income and spend it quickly, boosting the economy.  For every $1 added to the minimum wage, those households spend an additional $2,800 the following year.  Raising minimum wage does not cause job loss, even during periods of recession.  In fact, the opposite is true:  Raising minimum wage to $10.10 per hour would generate $22 billion in additional economic activity and around 85,000 jobs, estimates Economic Policy Institute.

 We can contact our legislators to help solve this problem.   Urge them to pass The Fair Minimum Wage Act (H.R. 1010/S.460) and the Minimum Wage Fairness Act (S.1737).  Think of those minimum-wage workers you know (particularly women) who may very likely be living now below the poverty level.  By implementing the Fair Minimum Wage Act, 4.6 million non-elderly Americans would see their incomes rise above the poverty line.  And that includes 2.8 million women and girls!

(Sources:  Huff Post, "Working Mothers Now Top Earners in 40 Percent of Households with Children: Pew", Hope Yen, May 15, 2014; National Women's Law Center, "Fair Pay for Women Requires Increasing the Minimum Wage and Tipped Minimum Wage", March 28, 2014; Pew Research Center, "Who Makes Minimum Wage", Drew Desilver, July 19, 2013)