Jobs putting women in workplace in record numbers
Gains for women attributed to growth in education, hospitality and health care sectors
The future may, indeed, be female if U.S. jobs numbers are any indication.
In December, for the first time since April 2010, women held a majority of jobs in America, not counting self-employed individuals and farm laborers.
The data released by the Labor Department on Friday shows women holding 50.04 percent of jobs, outpacing men by 109,000.
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The only other time the number of women equaled or outnumbered men in the workplace was 2009 and 2010. That power shift was attributed to the manufacturing and construction jobs lost during the recession, which disproportionately affected men.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the gain by women was due to strong hiring in the education, hospitality and health care industries.
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Specifically, health care had an increase of 28,100 jobs. Many of those additions took place in the ambulatory health care services, with 23,100 positions. Physicians accounted for 5,400 employees.
Meanwhile, according to the Wall Street Journal, industries typically male-dominated like manufacturing and mining, lost a combined 21,000 jobs.
Men still take up a larger portion of the total workforce since the majority of self-employed Americans are male.
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For example, mining and logging posted a 9,000 worker decline, and transportation and warehousing positions dropped by 10,400. Manufacturing lost 12,000 workers. That sector added just 46,000 workers in 2019, a big drop from the 264,000 positions it created in 2018, according to the Labor Department.
The U.S. economy, in the midst of the longest expansion on record, is continuing a trend of slow-but-steady growth. The economy added 145,000 jobs, while the jobless rate held steady at 3.5 percent, the lowest rate since 1969.
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The latest figure brings the 2019 total to 2.11 million, the lowest amount since 2011 when the economy added 2.09 million jobs. In 2018, the economy added 2.63 million jobs, the most in three years.
Last year, job growth on average was slower than it was in 2018: The monthly average in 2019 was just below 180,000 jobs per month, compared with an average gain of 223,000 in 2018.
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FOX Business' Megan Henney contributed to this report.