Funding for To The Contrary provided by: This week on To The Contrary: why women are leaving the workforce.

We discuss the state of the job market and Democrats attempt to rebrand and leave “woke” behind.

Will it work?

Hello, I'm Bonnie Erbé.

Welcome to To The Contrary, a discussion of news and social trends from diverse perspectives.

Up first, women and the economy.

American women are leaving the workforce in large numbers, driven by return to office mandates, shrinking childcare support and federal job cuts.

Black women are hit especially hard, losing jobs at a faster rate than any other group.

Meanwhile, President Trump's Bureau of Labor Statistics nominee has hinted at suspending monthly job reports.

Critics say this could obscure how women and women of color are doing in the job market.

Joining me are feminist activist Erin Matson, Center for Equal Opportunity founder Linda Chavez, Democratic strategist Patricia Sosa, and IWF policy analyst Neeraja Deshpande.

Erin Matson, how are wome and particularly women of color doing in the job market?

Bonnie, they're doing terribly and it's going to hurt everyone.

We're already losing immigrants out of the labor force because of deportation.

If we start losing white women and black women as well, we'll be in real trouble.

Canary in the coal mine.

It's a sign that there are issues with the workforce and do not think it's just the other people, they're black women, and I'm not.

It's going to impact everybody.

The entire labor marke is undergoing a lot of changes, and that's okay.

Change is a part of the labor force and of companies, and of the government.

Restructuring happens and everybody gets affected, not just women and not just women of color.

We have a president in the white House who is, if you just look at his cabinet, it has many fewer women and women of color involved at the top levels of his administration than prior presidents.

Does that, do you think, have anything to do with it?

I mean, I see plenty of women.

I see his press secretary for instance, Karoline Leavitt, I see women like Tulsi Gabbard, I see women like Susie Wiles.

There are lots of women in really prominent public facing roles.

And I don't think it's necessarily fair to say that those women don't care.

There was a recent Wall Street Journal article, actually, about conservative women having it all and how conservative wome are really stepping up in this Trump administratio and balancing family and career and, and really, I think promoting women, women's, empowerment, in a way that looks different from traditional, maybe liberal women's empowerment.

Traditional i maybe a funny word there, but, it, it, it looks a little bi different, but it's still there.

And I would not say that, you know, there's any sexism or misogyny here.

Patricia, how are women of color seeing it?

I think there's less women.

And he's really fighting black women in leadership.

The latest is that ex-member of the Federal Reserve Board.

Hopefully she will be able to keep her job because he has no right to fire her.

But the most important point here is the policy and the impact of the policy.

We've been debating child care forever, you know, for the last decades in the United States.

We know that's what women need in order to stay in the workforce, particularly during the period of child rearing.

And they're cutting all of that.

Absolutely all of that.

And the flexibility that women earned or gained during Covid also been taken away.

So we know what we need to do in order to support women.

And they're not doing it.

So yes, you can have all the values in the world, and you conservative women could feel really, really good about themselves because their values are reflected in that administration.

But in practice, in terms of what women need to be able to be in the workforce and to have motivation to have children, they start there.

If you want more children, women need a good job that they're going to feel they're going to be able to support their families, and these policie are not providing that to them.

Does anybody feel that we're going to start losing population?

We are.

Because women are no going to want to have children?

Absolutely.

We're going to start losing population.

We are going to se a birth dearth for two reasons.

One is what Trump is doing on immigration.

In fact, it is immigrants who have slightly more children, than American born of all ethnicities.

By the way, Mexican Americans have fewer children, for example, than Mexican immigrants do.

So we're going to see that.

But there is an important thing that's going on in terms of the cuts in the federal government.

Blacks in particular, are more likely to take government jobs and that is because of a history of discrimination in the private sector.

And so they gravitated towards government.

Women, black women, were represented in twic the numbers as their proportion of the population in federal jobs.

So you start slashing government jobs, and of course it's going to hit black women more.

Erin, do you think, women of color are watching this and care about this?

Oh, absolutely, Bonni and I want to name the problem.

Living through an authoritarian takeover sucks.

It sucks for everyone.

And one of the ways we're seeing this expressed is the brain drain of women from the workforce and women of color from the workforce, and what we know is just as Linda was saying, women of color have been especially represented in the federal government.

So when everybody is gettin fired, we're talking about women getting fired.

We're talking about black women getting fired.

We're talking about women of color getting fired.

And this is, as I said in the beginning, this is everyone's problem.

This is not just women's problem.

This is not just a problem as a feminist who has fought my whole life for women to have a fair shake and an abilit to participate in public life.

This is the fact that th economy is going down the tubes for everyone.

Consumer confidence is plummeting.

Things are too expensive.

We know that with black women in particular, more likely to b a top earner in the household.

This is something that hurts all of us.

Neeraja, what do you think?

Are women of color upset?

Worried?

Feel like the world is, or at least the job world, is turning against them?

I mean, I'm a woman of color, and I certainly don't feel that way.

I think, you know, listen, I'm 24 years old.

I turn 25 in a month.

I will say I am on the younger side, right?

I hope to have children.

I think the women in my friend groups, the women that I interac with, liberal or conservative, you know, they still hope to have children.

I think, you know, I think the idea that somehow we all have this homogenous view of, of the job market, of our live just because of who's in power.

You know, who's in power changes every four years.

It changes every two years with Congress.

You know, deciding tha you're going to live your life based on who's in office, you know, whether it's Biden or Trump or someone else altogether.

I think, you know, that's not something that I think most women want, right?

Most women want autonomy.

They want the, the ability to do, with their lives, what they want.

They want choices.

Right?

And, I don't think, you know, ceding those choices to Trump or to Biden or to Obama or anyone for that matter, is is really something that we're necessarily interested in.

And I don't thin that there's one homogenous way that women of color look at things.

You know, I have friends who are more conservativ than me, who are women of color.

I have friends who are less conservative than me.

You know, everyone has different jobs.

Everyone has different careers.

Everyone has different sort of skills that they bring to the job market.

And so I think, again there's restructuring going on, certainly.

Things like AI are coming in, things like, I mean, even just, you know, reevaluation of what companies need after big, big hiring surpluses in 2021.

Yeah.

I mean, things change, but that's not necessarily, you know, a good thing or a bad thing.

It just is.

And, you know, the sooner I think people accept that, the better their own lives are becaus they realize they have autonomy.

And, you know, that there are things beyond their control, but that, insofar as there are things within their control, they have autonomy.

Who thinks that people of color, women of color, are noticing what is going on and are going to rebe at the voting booth next year?

Absolutely.

Well, they never voted for Trump to begin with, and it's probably one of the reasons.

But let me differ from my colleague, conservative colleague because we're not talking about choices of like, I like my president or don't like my president.

That's a very superficial analysis.

We're talking about the policies that impact people's lives and ability to work an to take care of their children.

That's what we're talking about.

Don't the companies have a choice to let women with children to stay and work from home?

They were able to do it during Covid.

They certainly could do it now, but they decide not to do it.

Why?

They're mostly men making the decisions.

They have motivations from, you know, the White House, not to do it because they own real estate and they want people to be in the building.

So their buildings that are their investments, you know, keep their value.

They don't want the change.

You're right.

Things are changing but they don't want the change because that change doesn't benefit their economic interests and is at the cost and the difficulties and the barriers for working moms, which is for the reason why in the last 3 or 4 years, more and more working moms were staying in the workforce because they had the flexibility and now theyre taking that flexibility away.

And that is not necessary.

They could keep that flexibility Does anybody think we would be seeing I don't know about riots in the streets, but you know, protests and more women speak, especially women of color speaking out and saying this is happening to us and we don't want it?

Hey Bonnie, one of the way I think this is going to express itself people are obsessed right now.

What is the Democratic Party going to do?

Let's go back and center.

Black women are the most reliable voting base in the Democratic Party.

And so I think one of the things that we are going to see is that the Democratic Party message is likely to include a lot more on unemployment and economic security, because it's most loya base of voters is experiencing this downturn of being shoved out of the workforce.

Let me just weigh in as a conservative with a slightly different approach than Neerajas approach.

Conservatives have always believed that in order for an economy to prosper, you had to grow the labor force you had to grow the workforce.

And in fact, what we've been seeing, and it isn't just under the Trump administration, we have been seeing a shrinking labor force.

That is not good for the economy.

It's not good for man.

It's not good for women.

And we do need to take a har look of why this is happening.

I agree with Patricia that during Covid and the aftermath, we had a lot of women who were given the opportunity to work from home.

As somebody who started working at home in 1987 and, and worked for many, many years from home.

It is not just a luxury, but it actually makes it possible to be able to balance family and work.

And I think a lot of employers know that, which is why there are more flexible rules even today.

But we have somethin structurally going on in the US economy.

AI may be part of it, but I think it's not the whole story, and it is something that is going to dramatically affect all of us.

But does anybody agree with me that they feel like if there were this huge wav of frustration and anger about, you know, Trump cutting back quite purposefully on asking companies not to help women with things such as job sharing or working from home and really taking every—trying to knock job policies back to, some would say, the 1950s, if he thought that was going to hurt him politically, wouldn't he not do it?

I would just say that he's not doing that.

You know, I think there were a lot of regulations during the Biden years, during the Obama years, that made it more difficult, actually, for, for women to have flexible options because of laws around independent contracting.

That's something that Independent Women, the organization I work at has done a lot of work on.

Right.

So I think when you look at deregulatory measures from Republicans, those actually help women.

And I think one other thing that I'll note about remote work.

I work at an organization that operates completely remotely, right.

I work with a lot of moms, a lot of working moms.

But I also know a lot of organizations that are hybrid, right?

A lot of organizations that do operate best with people in office five days a week.

I don't think it's necessarily that they're just trying to get women out of the workforce.

I don't think that's necessarily what's happening.

I think the point is that som companies work best in person.

You know, there is magic that happens in person that doesn't happen remotely.

And there are things that, you know, happen remotely that don't happen in person.

You know, every organization has different needs.

And to say that, oh, just one approach, one remot approach works for everything, and to say otherwise, to sa anything else is sexist, right?

To cut remote options is sexist.

I don't think that makes sense.

I have a lot of friends who are engineers who can't do anything outside of the office just because their work relies so much on collaboration.

You know, doctors can't do that.

Nurses can't do that.

There are jobs that just can't.

Factory workers can't do it for the most part.

Factory workers can't.

And honestly, retail workers can't, right?

We're talking a lot about, you know, professional women, who are able to have, you know, careers.

Right.

But that's actually minority of women.

Most women have jobs, not careers.

So retail workers actually have to show up.

Do we not thin that retail workers are mothers?

Do we not think that retail workers are caregivers at home to maybe elderly family members, disabled family members?

Those are things that women tend to take on.

So I just, I don't necessarily think it's all about, you know, remote work versus not.

It's about the fact that after the pandemic, you know, there were more options.

Again, there were more choices.

And some companie have chosen to return to office just because that they know that's how it works best.

Independent Women's Forum has been operating remotely for years.

So we did not go to any office, you know, ever I think, you know, since I think 2011.

Well, Bonnie, I think the work from home clawbacks is a real issue that is driving some women, out of the workforce, that it's making very hard for them to participate and is resulting in a brain drain for the company.

And they're losing you know, they're losing real talent and skill, and women are losing their jobs as a result.

But that's one issue.

I think another issue that we need to talk about that's much more difficul and systemic is what's happening with childcare because of these absolutely bananas, berserk federal funding cuts that have been done by King, you know, Penstroke, contrar to what Congress has allotted.

First of all, some of the grants for child care have been yanked.

So there's issues with child care centers that are not having, not able to provide services.

Another major factor Linda touched on this earlier.

The crackdown on immigration and people in this country who want to be here, who want to have—who are working toward ways of citizenshi and having that denied to them, that is resulting in a massive los of child care options as well.

And that is a bigger issue.

I think it's convenien to point toward, you know, oh, women are making these choices to leave because of xyz, but if you can't have your kids cared for, you really can't work.

It's just a fact.

And that is a huge piece underpinning and that is happening as a direct result of wha this government has been doing.

And Linda, you you have a book that just came out called The Silver Candlesticks, a novel that you wrote.

Why aren't we seeing more women like you coming forward and say, I, I couldn't have my book published if it weren't for working from home.

I have worked from home forever.

Like, Neeraja, I headed up The Center for Equal Opportunity for 30 years now, and worked remotely for that.

But I've also been a fan of the kind of collaboration that takes place in offices.

If you are a writer, writing in an office, apart from other people is probably the best place.

But if you need to collaborate, with your fellow workers, that's good too.

And I agree with Erin that choices in terms of, you know, who cares for your children, we just don't have the number of people we need who are able to provide that kind of care, whether it's in the home or in daycare centers.

And employers have in the past, you know, stepped up and offered their workers choices to be able to bring kids to work in daycare centers.

And it's really too bad if we're seeing less of that, because we are 50% of the population.

And if you're going to, you know, basically make it difficult for half of the population.

And by the way, the better educate half of the population in recent years, it' going to make it very difficult for your company to succeed.

Democrats have to run on defending the Constitution and democracy.

Really that should be the number one.

That's the biggest challenge we have right now.

But—and I do think that they should not be an agenda of, you know, bringing back what it was.

What it was is gone.

It's really being creative on solutions.

And what we are going to see is more state and local funding and policy.

And that's what were fighting for, because right now, what they're doing is what they accuse the Democrats of doing.

I'm talking about the Trump administration, which is imposing their views in all states and all cities and all communities.

And, you know, I live in Washington, DC.

I live in an occupied cit right now, in which, you know, I see some of the basi rights of many of my residents and definitely the immigrants being stepped all over and really why the reaso why the Democratic brand is so, you know, has such a bad reputation right now, and they're doing s poorly in the polls is because the citizens are objecting to what's happening.

The majority are the polls are against the, you know, against Trump on even his immigration stance, which always been his strong point on the economic policy, on the tariffs.

But they don't see the Democrats as bringing a solution to the problem.

And I think that's really the issue here, tha they need to be very creative.

And the most important thing that they need to defend is democracy and the Constitution.

All right.

And you all let us know what you think.

Please follow me on X @BonnieErbe.

From the job market to politics.

Democrats are struggling with a weak national brand reeling after their party's losses in the last election.

A new generation of younger Democrats are pushing to take over from the party's aging leadership, using social media and grassroots energy to connect with voters.

But we don't know which direction the party will take us in the coming months and in the upcoming midterm elections.

One attempt to rebrand the party focuses on running “national security moms,” candidates who fit the bill, including Abigail Spanberger and Mikie Sherrill, who Democratic strategists describ as tough, capable and relatable.

So are these the kinds of women, Linda Chavez, Democrats should be looking to pic back up the House if they can, or gain seats in Congress or just do better than they did last time?

I think they have to look more towards the center, more towards moderate voices.

I think the era of woke is over, and I think that Democrats alienated a whole lot of people with rhetorical issues that really didn't matter to huge numbers, but served Republicans very well because they could use it sort of as a battering ram against Democrats.

But, you know, sort of picking up on some of what we talked about in the last segment.

Nobody likes chaos.

And unfortunately, Democrats— I wouldn't say— I wouldn't say looking at who's running Washington these days, that nobody likes it.

Well, I, I, no, I think, you know, frankly, you know, putting troops on the street and making i look like a military occupation gives a sense of order.

It may not be the orde that we want, but I think that Neeraja was right in terms of the impression that our country has gotten out of control and crime has gotten out of control.

It isn't just blue cities.

Nashville and Memphis have higher homicide rates than Washington DC does.

And those are red states.

So it's not necessarily a political issue.

It is an issue of doing something effective.

And people like Spanberger and Sherrill, two people, women running in Virginia for governor and another in New Jersey.

They're talking the kind of talk that I think is going to be appealing to more voters.

And Democrats would be very well advised to look for more candidates like that.

Erin, if you were advising the Democrats, what issue to run on in the upcoming midterms, what would you be telling them?

Well, I agree with much that has been said by my esteemed colleagues here.

I will say that I think the number one issue is freedom in this country, that we are in the midst of an authoritarian takeover.

Patricia was calling it democracy.

The fact is, when freedom of speech, freedom o everything is being curtailed, that's a critical issue and we want everyone to participate.

In terms of candidates themselves, I think we're goin to see a range and that's okay.

You know, I also want to push back on this idea that it's just Democrats versus Republicans.

We are not i a traditional moment right now.

There are— There is— We're in a fight of truly, do we— are we a nation that abides by the rule of law?

Do we heed the Constitution?

I think that appeals to a lot of people.

I'm excited to see the rise of the so-called national security Democratic woman.

You know, I just saw pictures of the head of North Korea, Russia and China marching together.

Our country is in a state of decline.

This federal government is frankly, destroying our country and destroying what we have been and what we have stood for.

And so it's going to take candidates and messages of all kinds, and it's okay.

The Democratic Party i in a moment of figuring it out.

I don't think we should draw extraordinarily broad conclusions about what has been as the problem.

Let's name one of the things that was—Joe Biden should not have run.

He was a disastrous candidate.

And so it's hard because we don't have a clear set of data of what would have happened if we would have actually had a no tremendously flawed candidate.

I mean, I'm obviously not a Democrat.

So I think that, you know, that's their call to make.

But I mean, young people are going to be the future.

I tend to worry that young Democrats like young Republicans actually, I think young people on both sides are very partisan, very extrem sometimes, I worry about that.

And, you know, as Erin said, I mean, I do agree that it, you know, this country shouldn't be about Democrats versus Republicans.

I disagree that we're in an authoritarian takeover of this country.

But I do agree that, you know, there is commonality.

There is common ground.

And I hope, I hope that, as you know, the young generation ages a little bit, we moderate, on both sides, rather than just, rather than falling into extremist traps.

That's that's a real concern of mine.

And I, I'm not super optimistic about young Democrats in this regard.

I see people like Zohran Memdani in New York, who see like very far left socialists, and I'm concerned about that.

I really am and, you know, that's maybe not the answer you're looking for, but but I, I, I think thats really goin to be the future of the party.

And there are some things that, you know, they can learn from the older members of the party, even if I disagree with those older members.

And that direction toward moderation is, is really a helpful one.

That's it for this edition of To The Contrary.

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