Child care may be far from students' minds as they prepare to graduate from the University of Utah on Thursday. But their commencement speaker wants to bring it to the forefront.
Women in the Beehive State and across the nation won't be on equal footing with men, maintains "Why Women Still Can't Have it All" writer Anne-Marie Slaughter, until mothers and fathers share the burden of caring for children and aging family members.
Utah's female workers have ground to gain. They are behind most of their counterparts nationwide in wages, education levels and representation in government, according to some reports. For example, mothers working full time in Utah are paid 61 cents for every dollar paid to fathers, behind the national average of 73 cents, found an analysis of census data released Wednesday from the National Women's Law Center.
Slaughter, for her part, hopes her message will resonate with graduates as they begin their careers.
"They now are all about themselves and building their lives," Slaughter said in an interview. "At 32 and 42 and 52, you will be needing to be making room to care for your own family."
The former U.S. Department of State official sparked debate on "having it all" with her 2012 Atlantic Magazine article on why balancing top jobs and parenting was not possible for her. She stepped down from the post to have more time with her teenage sons.
But now Slaughter says the discussion on "having it all" is too narrow, because it focuses largely on women. Men also need to step up to take time off, advocate for paid leave and lobby for government-subsidized child care, Slaughter said. She makes the case in her book "Unfinished Business: Women Men Work Family," which was released in September.
And CEOs would be wise to give families flexibility to raise the next generation of workers, she contends, because it would allow more to join the workforce.
Slaughter believes young men are starting to join their female partners and coworkers in advocating for those reforms.
"I see the first tender green shoots of change," she said.
Former state Sen. Pat Jones, who is CEO of the state's Women in Leadership Institute, agrees. Her organization, founded last year, aims to drive the number of female employees, executives and elected officials in Utah. Dozens of companies and state officers have stepped up to the challenge, though there is no deadline or specific benchmarks for participants such as Questar Corporation and Utah Valley University.
Her group also is working with young businessmen and women, Jones said, to help executives understand why flexibility is important.
Still, Jones notes that many women in the state choose to stay home with children.
"They should be supported and appreciated," she said.
About 60 percent of Utah's working women are employed full time, show data from the Division of Workforce Services. But the state's gender wage gap still is wider than the national average. U. professor Gunseli Berik, who studies the wage gap, believes bias against female employees may be a significant factor.
Fewer years of experience due to interruptions in their careers also could play a part.
"Moreover, in some occupations employers may be rewarding extremely long hours (e.g., law)," Berik wrote in an email, "and women may not be willing to put in those hours."
Slaughter, for her part, believes there is not one solution.
"What I want people to think about is that pursuing your individual goals is great and rewarding, and America was built on it. But investing in others is just as important and just as rewarding," Slaughter said. "There's an important line between the American dream and just setting ourselves up for failure and frustration."
It won't be the first campus visit for the Princeton professor, who also is president and CEO of the think tank New America. She previously spoke to law school students in the 1990s.
Slaughter is set to deliver commencement addresses at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and New York City's Barnard College later this month.
aknox@sltrib.com
Twitter: @anniebknox
Denise Applewhite | Courtesy University of Utah's 2016 commencement speaker Anne-Marie Slaughter became one of the countryÕs most talked about writers after she published an in-depth and controversial look into the extreme work-life balance hurdles of todayÕs professional women.
Denise Applewhite | Courtesy University of Utah's 2016 commencement speaker Anne-Marie Slaughter became one of the countryÕs most talked about writers after she published an in-depth and controversial look into the extreme work-life balance hurdles of todayÕs professional women.