"Obama also emphasized the need to rebuild the nation’s physical infrastructure and committed specific funding for outreach and training to ensure that these jobs revitalizing schools, roads and rails are available to women and minorities. ' There was some effort to get some of the [...]

"This decline in public employment will inevitably be intensified by further cuts in public spending and has particularly ominous implications for women, who make up a disproportionate share of state and local payrolls. As Eileen Appelbaum points out , men were harder hit by job [...]

"Men were hit harder and earlier by job losses than women in the downturn. As of last month, the unemployment rate for adult men was 8.9 percent, versus 8 percent among women. But men are also recovering faster and have made back about 28 percent [...]

"Studies from sick-leave advocacy groups — including the Institute for Women's Policy Research , the Urban Institute and the Drum Major Institute for Public Policy — conclude that businesses have emerged largely unscathed. "Most San Francisco employers reported that implementing (the ordinance) was not difficult [...]