March is Women’s History Month

Before March comes to an end, we want to recognize National Women’s History Month. You may have seen some stories in the news this month about the topic, or possibly, you didn’t even know there was a month designated as such. Believe it or not, the beginning of Women’s History Month goes all the way back to 1857 when female factory workers in New York City held a protest in the streets about unfair working conditions.

The United States Congress didn’t make an official proclamation to support the movement until 1981, when it designated the second week in March as National Women’s History Week. Finally, in 1987, Congress expanded the designation to include the entire month of March. Since then, each year,   Congress has passed a resolution and the sitting president has issued a proclamation honoring women.

Here are some fun facts about women that have recently been collected and released by the United States Census Bureau.

164 million          Number of females in the United States, compared to 159.1 million males (2016)

4.2 million           Number of women in the U.S. ages 85+, compared to 2.2 million men the same age

76.8 million         Number of female workers ages 16+ in the U.S. workforce in 2016

16%                      Percentage of active-duty U.S. military members who are female (2016)

1.6 million           Number of female veterans in the U.S. and Puerto Rico (2016)

Here is a chart that illustrates the changes in the number of women employed in select occupations over the past 17 years.

Sources: Information courtesy of  census.gov and photo credit to pexels.com.