Just in time for Mother's Day, a new survey has ranked Arizona as the fourth worst state in the nation for working moms.
According to personal-finance website WalletHub, more than 70 percent of moms with children under the age of 18 are working, making the issue of gender inequality in the workplace even more of an issue.
"Not only do parental leave policies and other legal support systems vary by state, but the quality of infrastructure — from cost-effective day care to public schools — is also far from uniform as well," the website says.
WalletHub conducted a state-by-state analysis to determine which states are the best and worst for working moms. Using 13 metrics, the data set ranges from median salary to female unemployment rate to day-care quality.
On the bright side, Arizona doesn't rank as one of the five states with the worst day-care systems and isn't in the top five for highest child-care costs, but some of the other findings are grim.
Using a scale that ranks number one as "best" and 25 as "average," WalletHub broke down life as a working mom in Arizona:
- 21st – Day-care quality
- 25th – Child-care costs (adjusted for median women’s salary)
- 17th – Pediatricians per capita
- 44th – Gender pay gap (women’s earnings as percentage of men’s)
- 26th – Ratio of female executives to male executives
- 31st – Median women’s salary (adjusted for cost of living)
- 38th – Female unemployment rate
- 40th – Parental-leave policy score
- 35th – Average length of woman’s workday (in hours)
- 30th – Percentage of single-mom families in poverty
Read the full study here and see where Arizona stacks up against the rest of the country.
