North Looking South
By John Barham, Dec 08, 2006

Some thoughts on women and the Mexican economy

Second in a series on the Mexican economy

Last Friday, 44-year-old Felipe Calderón was inaugurated as president of Mexico. Virtually all observers of the Mexican political scene agree that the challenges facing the new president are enormous, and that there is no challenge more daunting than that of growing the nation’s economy.

With vast segments of the economy controlled by monopolistic interests such as those represented by Telmex baron Carlos Slim and TV-Azteca’s Ricardo Salinas, an inordinate proportion of Mexico’s wealth is tilted toward the wealthiest 6 percent of the population, which includes anywhere from 11 to 20 billionaires—in any case, more than the combined total for Britain and France. One of the consequences of this inequitable distribution of income is widespread distrust of the motives of government, resulting in an all-too-prevalent attitude of disrespect for the law.

If they are resolute about tackling the problem of poverty and increasing jobs, President Calderón and his economic advisers will be waging an uphill fight against entrenched factions that will resist mightily any effort to alter the status quo. Also, a badly divided and extremely partisan Congress would seem to bode ill for any efforts intended to produce economic reforms. 

The most common estimate of the percentage of the Mexican population living in poverty is 45 percent. And, if more jobs are created, it will be this portion of society that will stand to derive the most benefit. In addition, the 70 percent of the 45 percent who are women and children are unquestionably those who are in greatest need.

In Mexico today, about 12 million women may be found in the workforce, most of whom function in the informal economy without guarantee of regular wages and benefits. This figure represents 38 percent of the total number of working Mexicans. Only about 6 million of these women are covered by Mexican state health systems or by some other form of health insurance.

Traditionally, women were transitional workers who left the labor force because of marriage, pregnancy or other family responsibilities. Economic conditions in the last quarter of the 20th century have made two wage earners essential to support most families and obliged more women to undertake employment on a more or less permanent basis.

Until relatively recently, Mexico’s push to become a major exporter of manufactured products saw unparalleled growth in the maquiladora, or assembly plant, portion of the economy, which at its height employed 1.2 million workers, the vast majority of whom were women. Despite low wages and abysmal working conditions often marked by blatant sexual harassment, thousands of women migrated to the border to seek full-time employment in plants run by US Fortune 500 companies.

Despite performing the same unskilled jobs on assembly lines as their male counterparts and regardless of legislation prohibiting discrimination in the workplace, female labor in the maquiladoras has often been compensated at rates far less than those for equivalent male workers, with wages averaging from US$6 to US$7 per day. Nevertheless, as a precedent-setter, the presence of women in the maquiladoras has been a major breakthrough for Mexican women in the workplace and in society as a whole.

With more two-wage-earner families in Mexico, there has been rising approval of joint responsibility for child-rearing and household chores. However, surveys conducted through UNAM indicate that untraditional views on such matters are strongly influenced by education and income.

From the 1960s, when the average Mexican woman gave birth seven times over her lifetime, to the present, a major transformation has taken place for Mexican women. At present, the birth rate per woman has dropped to 2.8. This is significant, inasmuch as this trend, along with a nascent feminist movement that began in the 1980s, has provided women with more time and the rationale to pursue activities outside the home. 

Although at least 20 percent of the female population over 15 years of age is illiterate, more than 25 percent of the adult female population in Mexico has graduated from high school. And, along with this number, there is a growing presence of women in higher education following curricula that a mere generation ago were limited to men. In 2006, it is no longer unusual to encounter female doctors, lawyers, accountants and engineers, along with those serving in secondary and primary education, where numbers of women were formerly more concentrated.

Many of the villages of Guanajuato state have been critically affected by the mass exodus of the male population to the US. In many instances, local women have summoned forth courage and the ability to hold together families and communities through income-producing activities. A case in point is the cooperative marketing of arts and crafts in San Miguel de Allende, such as that undertaken by Mujeres Trabajando Juntas (Women Working Together). Similar endeavors in other regions of the country demonstrate the resilience and creativity characteristic of Mexican women.

Daily, those of us who shop San Juan de Dios and other local markets witness the entrepreneurial talents of Mexican women who are dominant in this realm of enterprise. Oftentimes, the thought enters one’s mind that, if this incredible source of commercial power were taken advantage of and focused on the challenge of developing the economy, the mission of President Calderón and his economic advisers would be somewhat less problematic.

Some have lamented the effects of the hard-charging economies of the Pacific Rim nations for the present state of the Mexican economy. However, those economies have distinguished themselves, as have those of virtually all the developed nations, by their efforts to educate and fully integrate women into essential economic endeavors. Hopefully, the new administration will take heed and make such efforts an important part of its plans to jump-start the Mexican economy into the 21st century. 

John Barham, after a long career as a professor and administrator in colleges and universities in the United States and the Middle East, now lives in San Miguel de Allende. He lectures frequently on Mexican history for the international Elderhostel program and may be contacted at barhamjw@yahoo.com