逍遥学能 2013-06-11 13:23
March is Women’s History Month in the United States, an opportunity to examine how far women have come and the areas where there is still work to be done. One of these areas is employment and income, according to a recent report released by the White House.
3月是在美国的妇女历史月，这是一个检验妇女状况有多大进展,以及还有哪些方面有待改进的时机。据白宫不久前发表的一份报告，需要改进的地方之一在就业和收入方面。
"Women in America: Indicators of Social 初中语文 and Economic Well-Being" offers a look at the full measure of a woman’s life. It’s the first comprehensive federal report of this nature since President Kennedy appointed Eleanor Roosevelt in the early 1960s to do a report on women," says Rebecca Blank, undersecretary of economic affairs, adding the new report covers five main areas of women’s lives. "It brings together data focusing on families, education, income and employment, health, and crime and violence, and really highlights the trends of what’s happening in women’s lives across all of those domains over the last 20 to 30 years."
这份报告的题目是《美国妇女：社会和经济的幸福指标器》。报告对妇女生活提供了全方位的展示。主管经济事务的副部长吕贝卡?布兰克说：“自1960年代早期肯尼迪总统委派埃里诺?罗斯福起草一份妇女问题报告以来，这是第一份这种性质的综合性的联邦报告。”布兰克介绍说，新报告涵盖妇女生活的5大方面，“汇集了关于家庭、教育、收入及就业、健康、犯罪和暴力方面的资料，并且真正突出了过去二三十年间，在所有这些领域妇女生活发生的种种趋势。”
Compiling data from a variety of federal agencies, Blank says, revealed both positive and negative trends. Women are less likely than in the past to be the victims of violent crimes, including homicide. Women are marrying later and having fewer children than in the past. They make up 51 percent of the general population, and 57 percent of Americans over 65. Women are more likely than men to face health problems such as arthritis, obesity and depression… and are less likely to suffer from heart disease and diabetes.
布兰克说，汇编来自各联邦机构的资料，显示了积极和消极两方面的趋势。妇女不像以往那样容易沦为包括谋杀在内的暴力犯罪的受害者。妇女现在结婚较晚，生孩子较少。妇女在总人口中占51%，在65岁以上美国人口中占57%。妇女比男人更可能患关节炎、肥胖症和忧郁症等健康问题。她们患心脏病和糖尿病的可能性比男性小。
The report highlights significant improvement in the field of education. "There is good news in this report that suggests that women, their educational rates, are growing faster than men's," says Blank. "In fact, if you look at young women, they are graduating from college at a higher rate than young men right now in the United States. That’s true among all race and ethnic groups, not just white women."
报告着重介绍了在教育领域的显著改善。布兰克说：“报告里的好消息是，妇女受教育率的增长比男人更快。事实上，在今天的美国，年轻女性的大学毕业率比男青年高。这不仅局限于白人妇女，在所有种族和族群中都是如此”。
But women’s advancement in education hasn’t translated into income equality in the workplace. "One reason is that they are not going into the kind of fields that are high in income producing," says Valerie Jarrett, chairwoman of the White House Council on Women and Girls, who adds that the Obama Administration wants to eliminate that wage gap. "So the president, since early on in his administration, has had an effort to encourage women and girls to go into science and technology and engineering and math."
但是，妇女在教育方面的进步并未转化为职场中的平等收入。白宫妇女和女孩委员会主席法勒里?贾雷特说：“一个原因是，她们并没有进入那种高收入领域。”她接着说，奥巴马政府希望消除工资差别，“所以，总统自他开始就任以来，就努力鼓励妇女和女孩进入科学、技术、工程和数学领域。”
There are also other reasons for the pay inequity."When women accept a position, they often don’t negotiate the beginning salary in the same way that a man does," says Lee Ann De Reus, associate professor of women’s studies at Penn State Altoona. "This report also indicates that once women have a job, they are not likely as men to negotiate for salary increases over the years. Also, you have a lot of women who are working part time. So there are multiple reasons why women are still trying to balance work and family in a way that men are not. Part of that gets back to what it is that we think a man’s role is in the society and what we think a woman’s role is in the society."
宾州州立大学阿尔图那分校妇女学副教授李?安德鲁斯指出，工资不平等还有其他很多原因：“妇女接受一个职位时，往往不像男人那样提出起薪要求。报告还显示，妇女一旦找到工作，就不大会像男人那样年年都不断要求加薪。而且,还有许多妇女是做兼职工作。所以，有很多原因，使妇女仍在努力平衡工作和家庭间的关系，而男子不必为此操心。 一定程度上，它还归结于我们对男女各自社会角色的看法。”
De Reus hopes the "Women in America" report will highlight how the issues facing women today impact children, families and society as a whole. "The bottom line is that we all win. The country wins when we’re taking care of its citizens. I think with this report indicates that we’ll do better as a nation and our future will be brighter, if we start attending to the needs of women. It will only benefit all of us."
德鲁斯希望《美国妇女》这份报告将突出目前妇女所面临的这些问题如何影响孩子、家庭和整个社会。她说：“底线是我们都赢。当我们爱护我们国家的公民时，国家才能赢。我认为，这份报告要表明的是，如果我们开始关注妇女的需要，作为一个国家，我们将会更好，我们的未来会更加光明。这无疑有利于我们每一个人。”
The authors hope the information they’ve gathered in the "Women in America" report will translate into policies and initiatives to help women move forward and prepare girls for a life that’s better than what their mothers and grandmothers had.
报告的作者们希望，他们在这份《美国妇女》报告中收集的信息将转化成政策和计划，帮助妇女们继续改善，帮助女孩子们做好准备，迎接比她们的母亲和祖母们曾经历的更好的生活。