Women-Owned
A recent study estimates that women-owned firms produce employment for 16 percent of the U.S. workforce

Women-owned businesses contribute nearly $3 trillion to our national economy and create or maintain 23 million jobs according to a study by the Center for Women's Business Research. The study was funded by the National Women's Business Council and Wal-Mart.

The report, The Economic Impact of Women-Owned Businesses in the United States, adds to the current understanding of the economic contributions of women-owned firms that to-date, has relied only on number of firms, revenues and direct employment. The new research provides a more comprehensive picture of the total economic impact of women-owned firms, including the impact of the businesses' purchases and the purchasing power of their employees and suppliers.

• Approximately eight percent of the total labor force work directly for a woman-owned firm.
• If women-owned businesses were their own country, they would have the 5th largest GDP in the world, ahead of such countries as France, the United Kingdom, and Italy.
• Industries where women-owned businesses have the highest revenues include professional, scientific, and technical services; retail/wholesale; business services; communication/media; and administrative, support, and waste remediation.
• Source: Center for Women's Business Research

Women and Wall Street
Women-owned mutual funds significantly outperform funds in general, according to Hedge Fund Research, Inc. In studies of gender differences among both investors and professional money managers, women were shown to adopt more holistic and measured investment strategies that performed well over time while men were inclined to take larger risks, often with less consistent results. Source: National Council for Research on Women (NCRW)

Women and Jobs
Women now make up almost half of the U.S. labor force, up from 38 percent in 1970. This nearly forty-year trend has been fueled by a broad public consensus about the changing role of women in society.

While many Americans say it makes no difference to them whether they deal with a man or woman in a range of high-profile positions of authority, a survey by the Pew Research Center finds that they retain strong traditional gender preferences in a few positions, including elementary school teacher and police officer. The other positions tested were banker, surgeon, lawyer, airline pilot and family doctor. The accompanying chart shows the public's responses, based on interviews with the full sample of 2,250 adults. Source: Pew Research Center

Women and Work
Women account for nearly half of the entire U.S. labor force, one-third of all business owners, about 43 percent of U.S. citizens with gross assets of $1.5 million or more than half of the country's entire investment wealth. Source: National Council for Research on Women (NCRW)