Alabama ranks as the worst state in the South for women with an overall grade of D-, according to a recent report from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research.

Alabama receives D’s and F’s in all of the seven topical areas that affect women’s lives: political participation, employment and earnings, work and family, poverty and opportunity, reproductive rights and health and well-being.

The Status of Women in the South is the first report to provide a comprehensive portrait of the status of women, particularly the status of minority women, in 14 southern states.

“With over one third of the nation’s women and girls calling the South home, a lack of progress for women in the region is a setback for the United States overall and especially for the South,” said IWPR President Heidi Hartmann, Ph.D. and MacArthur Fellow.