Hispanic Women Profile

Hispanic Female Population
• The Hispanic female population includes 20.5 million, which is 13% of the total U.S female population
• 48.9% of the total U.S Hispanic population
• 66% of all U.S Hispanic females in 2002 are Mexicans
• 21% of the population is the age group under 5 years old. This higher representation continues through to age 39. à Implication for both consumer and labor markets

Hispanic Females’ Projections
According to Hispan Telligence, Hispanic females in the U.S will reach 51 million by 2050 (an increase of 194% from 2000).

Hispanic females will make up 25%of the total U.S female population (estimated to be 213.38 million, with only 48% growth) by 2050.

Educational Attainment
The attainment of Hispanic women surpasses that of Hispanic men in all educational categories, except for advanced degrees.

Hispanic women have a lower proportion of those with no high school degree (42 percent versus 44 percent of Hispanic men), and slightly higher proportions of those with high school degrees, some college/ associate degrees, and bachelor’s degrees.

Despite these disparities, Hispanic women have made significant gains in recent years. While the number of bachelor’s degrees conferred to U.S. women increased by 35 percent from 1976 to 2000, the number of bachelor’s degrees earned by Hispanic women soared by 430 percent over the same period.

Hispanic women have surpassed Hispanic men in graduate enrollment. In 2000, over 60 percent of Latinos enrolled in graduate education were women.

Increasing political participation
Of the 13.1 million Hispanic females, 63 percent (8.2 million) held U.S. citizenship in 2004, of which 60 percent (5 million) registered to vote.

55% of the eligible females voted compared to 45% of the registered males. 83% of the registered Hispanic women voted in 2004 presidential elections.

• 23.2%, the largest segment of Hispanic voters are females ages between 25 to 44
• 18.9%, males ages between 25 to 44 are following
• 17.4% , female voters ages between 45 to 64

Higher Level Jobs
In the past few decades, women have made strides in increasing their representation in higher level and better-paying jobs.

From 1983 and 2002, the percent of working women in jobs classified as managerial or professional specialty has increased from 21.9 percent to 33.7 percent.

This has now surpassed the comparable 2002 measure in the male population: only 28.9 percent of working men have jobs in this category.

Hispanic women trail in these job categories
There is 9.6 percent of working Hispanic women in jobs classified as executive, administrators, or managerial, compared with 16.2 percent of white working women.

Only 8.5 percent of Hispanic women are in the job category of professional specialty versus 20.7 percent of white women.

Increasing Participation Labor Force
As women’s labor-force participation has increased over the last few decades, the number of working mothers has also increased.

Large change is in the percentage of mothers with small children. For example, in 1975, only 34.3 percent of mothers with children under age 3 were in the labor force versus 60.5 percent in 2002.

As their children age, women’s participation in the labor force tends to increase. In 2002, the percentage of mothers with children between the ages of 6 and 17 in the labor force was 78.6 percent.

Hispanic mothers with children younger than 3 who were not classified as married showed an even higher labor force participation of 63.7 percent.

Earnings Correlated with Education
Earnings are positively correlated with education, though different groups show different average earnings for the same educational level.

Hispanic men show higher mean annual earnings than both Hispanic and white women at every educational level.

Hispanic women show higher average earnings than white women among those with no high school degree and those with advanced degrees.

Wealth gap remain between households headed by women and men

Hispanic households headed by a woman had just over one-third of the wealth of households headed by Latino men in 2002-$4,489 in comparison to $13,154. However, this ratio was much lower in the recent past, standing at less than one-fourth in 1996.

Standard of Living (moderate increase)
From 1979 to 2002, Hispanic women gained the median annual earnings from $18,720 to $20,592 (10% increases). However, white women showed a 30 percent increase over the same period.

The wage gap is smaller among Hispanics than whites.

Hispanic women earn 88 percent of Hispanic men’s earnings, while white women earn only 78 percent of white men’s earnings.

Increase Hispanic Women-owned Firms
Hispanic women lead other groups of minority women in terms of the number of firms owned. The 553,618 firms owned by Hispanic women are 30 percent more than the number owned by the second ranking group: Asian American and Pacific Islander females.

The number of firms owned by Hispanic women has increased by 63.9 percent from 1997 to 2004 (553,618 businesses in 2004).

The number of employees has risen from 234,591 in 1997 to 320,078 in 2004.

Sales have shown an impressive increase of 62.4 percent, reaching over $44 billion in 2004, according to the Center for Women’s Business Research.

Firms by Industry
The largest growth has been in the category of transportation, communications, and public utilities.

The number of Hispanic women-owned firms is increased by 72.5 percent between 1997 and 2004.

Other areas of growth include the service industry (62.4 percent) and construction firms (50.6 percent).

The service sector now comprises 58.1 percent of all Hispanic women-owned businesses. The next largest proportion is in the retail sector, containing 13.3 percent.