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Obama's 'Macho' Stimulus Plan Forgets Women

Job creation would largely go to men

By Nick McMaster, Newser Staff

Posted Nov 28, 2008 4:10 PM CST

(Newser) – Barack Obama’s stimulus package calls for new jobs to fix roads and bridges, build solar panels and wind-power turbines, and create green cars. Sounds great, except for one thing: These are all fields that employ mostly men. "This might as well be called the macho stimulus package," writes Randy Albelda in the Boston Globe. What about all the single mothers and unemployed women out there?

Obama's plan will do relatively little for them, Albelda writes. What to do? Invest more in education and health care. Not only because we, as a nation, desperately need to improve both, but also because women are heavily employed in those fields. "As Abigail Adams requested of her husband in 1776: Remember the ladies. Obama would be wise to do the same and balance the package."

[Images (2)]

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Construction workers build the frame of a house at a new housing development October 17, 2008 in Hayward, California. (Getty Images)

Wind turbines from the Maple Ridge Wind Farm tower over a farm in Lowville, N.Y., Monday, Aug. 4, 2008. (AP Photo/Mike Groll)

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There is a crucial missing link in this package—both on the employment side and the investment side. That link is women. - Randy Albelda, Boston Globe

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Obama's 'Macho' Stimulus Plan Forgets Women