Business opportunities one of factors ranking Utah last for women

LAST PLACE SINCE 2015 FOR EQUALITY 

Brice Wallace 

Utah has continued its grasp on being the state with the least women’s equality.

A ranking by WalletHub puts Utah dead last — again — for women’s equality, based on three factors and using 17 metrics. It’s a position Utah had held since 2015.

“Ensuring women’s equality requires more than simply giving men and women the same fundamental rights,” said Cassandra Happe, WalletHub analyst. “States also need to work to make sure that women receive equal treatment to men when it comes to financial opportunities, education and politics. The best states for women’s equality have drastically reduced the disparities between men and women on multiple fronts.”

Utah not only is last but last by a lot. Its WalletHub score is 23.04. The next-worst score is 39.75 in Texas. All other states have scores of at least 44.85. The highest score for women’s equality is 79.24 in Hawaii. Second-place California has a 71.50 score.

Among the study factors, Utah is last for workplace environment and for education and health, and No. 41 for political empowerment. It is last for the gender income gap, last for the gender work hours gap and last for the educational attainment gap, and it is No. 48 for the largest executive positions gap.

“Women’s rights in the U.S. have made leaps and bounds since the passage of the 19th Amendment, yet many women still struggle to break the glass ceiling because of unequal treatment in society,” WalletHub said. “In 2024, the U.S. only ranked 43rd on the World Economic Forum’s ranking of 146 countries based on gender equality.

“The workplace provides even more evidence of inequality. Despite advances toward social equality, women are disproportionately underrepresented in leadership positions. Women make up more than 50 percent of the population, but constitute only around 28 percent of legislators and 9 percent of S&P 500 CEOs.”

Other states ranked as having poor women’s equality are Utah neighbors Wyoming and Idaho, and Missouri. Joining Hawaii and California among the top states are Minnesota, Maine and New Mexico.

Details are at https://wallethub.com/edu/best-and-worst-states-for-women-equality/5835.

Earlier this year, WalletHub released rankings of the “best states for women,” in which Utah finished No. 35. It was ranked No. 48 for median earnings for female workers despite having the second-lowest percentage of women in poverty.

Among the organizations trying to strengthen the impact of Utah girls and women is the Utah Women & Leadership Project, founded in 2009 and led by Susan R. Madsen as part of her faculty position at Utah State University. In a recent report, the organization recommended that companies wanting to improve conditions for women compare their current offerings to see how they align with the report’s list of family-friendly policies and women-focused initiatives, create more inclusive workplaces for women by thoughtfully considering how to effectively support employees and their families, encourage workplaces in public entities to follow the same recommendations as businesses, and encourage legislators to consider and support research-based public policies that will help Utahns have more family-friendly workplace environments.