Data collected from the research from the nonprofit Catalyst disclosed that sixty of the Fortune 500 corporations do not possess any female directors. Out of the same group, 136 firms have no women among their top five executives. Moreover, there are 26 Fortune 500 companies which have neither a female in executive management, nor a woman board member. More than half of the United States workforce is made up of females. It is also widely recognized that they receive less than their male counterparts and the statistics are far worse for women of color. This disparity upsets women at every level of the job market. Women, who comprise almost 40% of the students attending elite business schools, find it especially difficult to rise into the ranks of senior management among the States’ largest public companies.
The companies were labeled in categories by industry following a review of the Catalyst information. Wall St press investigated their corporate websites to find out if they had any females in top management at all. While they finally managed to find somebody, they were usually in public relations, human resources, investor relations, or accounting. In the 21st Century it is incomprehensible how public companies can manage to eliminate women from such crucial positions, when Intuit Inc claims that a billion women will enter the workforce by 2020. The statistics are disgraceful and point to lingering misogyny in the board rooms and executive suites of a number of the largest companies. It is widely recognized that females make up a powerful global consumer force which has resulted in greater knowledge of mobile technologies, urban migration, increased access to education for women and a much wider use of the Internet. The study showed that with micro-credit burgeoning, combined with low market entry fees, that a ‘she-economy’ is about to evolve. There are more females in national positions than at any other time in history. The list consists of 3 queens as Head of State, 4 Governor Generals and 14 concurrent women national leaders.
This, in conjunction with the findings of the study, has led a few experts to state that we are about to enter the ‘women’s decade’. However, this is definitely not reflected in the board rooms and executive suite’s business sectors of the world. In the area of world politics, women are also still only noticed because of their lack of a major presence.}