The economic boom that has swept through America has not made all the positive changes women expected. Class differences have emerged more starkly than at any point in the last decade, driven particularly by education and marital status. CPA's seminal work on Women's Voices is the first and only research and polling initiative that has captured the policy priorities and values of women over most of the decade. Women's Voices put the gender gap on the map and focused the political debate about women on the real issues impacting American women in cities and towns across the country. Concern about moral values continues to top the list, and women and men continue to believe by large margins that parents having more time with their children is the preferred solution.
Education consistently ranks as a top issue for women.
In 1992, Women's Voices was the first poll to identify equal pay as a top priority for working women and identified the intertwined nature of family and work in the minds and hearts of women. In partnership with the Ms. Foundation for Women, CPA used Women's Voices to identify a core of women's shared economic issues centered around family economic security. In 1996, CPA went further to ask women for their solutions to the issues and found powerful support for enforcing equal pay laws, increasing the minimum wage and expanding entrepreneurship opportunities. Intergenerational consensus drove elder care and aging issues to the top of women's concerns. State specific polls in Colorado, Michigan, New Jersey and Ohio added weight to the findings.