keep’im barefoot and pregnant doesn't cut it anymore

One of the primary reasons for a shift from the Republican Party right wing to the Democratic Party center is the more powerful position of women in our society, commerce and government.

Stand by your man and keep’im barefoot and pregnant just doesn’t cut it when it is women who bring home the bacon in most American families.

The Shriver Report
A Woman’s Nation Changes Everything
By Maria Shriver and the Center for American Progress, edited by Heather Boushey and Ann O'Leary | October 16, 2009

“This report describes how a woman’s nation changes everything about how we live and work today. Now for the first time in our nation’s history, women are half of all U.S. workers and mothers are the primary breadwinners or co-breadwinners in nearly two-thirds of American families. This is a dramatic shift from just a generation ago (in 1967 women made up only one-third of all workers). It changes how women spend their days and has a ripple effect that reverberates throughout our nation. It fundamentally changes how we all work and live, not just women but also their families, their co-workers, their bosses, their faith institutions, and their communities.
Quite simply, women as half of all workers changes everything.”
From, Executive summary By Heather Boushey and Ann O’Leary

"The SHRIVER Report
A Woman’s Nation Changes Everything

• For the first time in our nation’s history, half of all U.S. workers are women.
• Mothers are the primary breadwinner or co-breadwinner in two-thirds of American families.
• The battle of the sexes is over. Now it's negotiations between the sexes—about work, family, household responsibilities, child care, and elder care.
• Compared to their fathers, 70 percent of men today are more comfortable having women work outside the home, and three-quarters of Americans view the rise of women in the workplace as a positive development for society.
• Government, media, and business have failed to adapt to how families live and work today.
• With the shift of women into the workplace, men now agree with women that government and business need to provide flexible work schedules, better child care, family and medical leave, and equal pay.
• Over 80 percent of men and women agree—businesses that fail to adapt to the needs of modern families risk losing good workers.
• Having religious faith is important to most Americans today, yet faith-based institutions have not kept up with the needs of the modern family.
• Women are more likely than men to graduate from college, yet they earn less than men and continue to be less likely to be in leadership positions in corporate America.
• Some researchers report that a wife feels more sexually attracted to a husband who pitches in around the house, and one of the biggest predictors of a husband’s marital satisfaction is how often he has sex."

Download the full report here:
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/10/pdf/awn/a_womans_nation.pdf
Summaries and a breakdown of the report here:
http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/10/womans_nation.html