Amazingly, almost all of America’s presidents and
practically all of Alabama’s governors of the past century have hailed from
small town America or small town Alabama. My assumption and prediction is that
when I am dead and gone and someone analyzes the same subject a hundred years
from now it will read, “Girls who grew up in small cities succeed.”
The America and Alabama I grew up in were made up of
small towns and were like a Norman Rockwell picture with kids riding their
bikes to school or on their paper routes or to a Saturday matinee with their
dog waiting outside the theater for them to go home, then to a game of baseball
that began extemporaneously in someone’s front yard. Today, most people in the
country grew up in a city like Los Angeles or Chicago. We are also a very
diverse nation. Our demographics are not homogenous. The nation is no longer a
white Anglo-Saxon protestant culture. Many of our cities more closely mirror
South American and Mexican republics. America is truly a melting pot.
Another observation is that girls are far exceeding
boys in academic and career achievement in the United States. This disparity is
very clear and pronounced. The proverbial glass ceiling has been broken and the
broken pieces are falling into the eyes of young males who are looking up at
the females surpassing them and exceeding them at every level.
I could observe this trend developing when I was in
the legislature. It became obvious to me that at every high school graduation I
attended the valedictorian was a female. In addition, eight out of ten of the
top academic finalists were female.
Today over 60% of all college students are women.
Close to 60% of law school seats are filled by women and medical school are now
over 50% female. Half of the Ivy League universities, including Harvard, are
headed by women.
This development will change the nature of American
life. This female academic superiority will transpire into superior economic
clout that will forever change the fabric of American life. We are becoming and
will continue to be a country of female breadwinners.
Assuming this current trend continues, by the next
generation more families will be supported by women than men. This development
will somewhat be driven by the rise in single parent families. However, it is
also increasingly true in two-earner families. The most recent figures reveal
that presently four in ten working wives out-earn their husbands. This is an
increase of more than 50% from 20 years ago. If this trend continues, the
results will be that eight out of ten wives will make more money than their
husbands in 20 years. What that means is that roles may very well reverse in
the next generation in the United States. The women will be the primary family
breadwinners and the men will be the homemakers.
The fastest and most pronounced dominance of any
profession being taken over by women is the law. Nationwide law schools are
currently 60% female and will be 75% within 20 years. Because the law is the
customary spawning pool for politics, look for women to progressively advance
politically. It is only a matter of time before the ultimate marble ceiling,
the presidency, is broken. Once that ice is broken it will be Katie bar the
door.
More than likely a cursory look at the nation’s Capitol
and the Alabama Statehouse a generation from now will reveal half men and half
women sitting in congressional and legislative seats and probably a woman
occupying the oval office and the governor’s office.
See you next week.
About the author: Steve Flowers is Alabama’s leading
political columnist. His column appears weekly in more than 70 Alabama
newspapers. Steve served 16 years in the state legislature. He may be reached
at http://www.steveflowers.us.
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