RSVP here!

Massachusetts is seen as a leader in progressive policy across the country, and yet our economy still depends on the unpaid labor of women and mothers every single day. Access to affordable child care is the single biggest barrier to gender equity in the workplace and our childcare system is in crisis:

• Massachusetts is the least affordable state for child care in the country, forcing overwhelmingly mother’s to exit the workforce.
• Childcare providers are overwhelmingly women, women of color, immigrants, small business owners, working out of their home and surviving on minimum wages.
• Massachusetts is the only state in the nation that places a 15% cap on the noncustodial parent’s child support obligation to the custodial parent for childcare expenses and the only state that revokes a parent’s right to spousal support (alimony) because they have accepted the care-taking responsibilities for both parents’ children.
• In December 2020 alone women accounted for 111% of the job loss, causing some economists to predict the gender wage gap will increase by five percentage points.

Senate President Spilka has been fighting for feminist values as a state legislator since 2001, and in 2018 was elected the Massachusetts Senate President, making her the third woman ever to hold the office. Mass NOW has been a proud collaborator and supporter of the Senate President, working to pass leading pay equity legislation in 2016 and on numerous gender and racial justice priorities. Most recently, in 2018, Senator Spilka helped pass ‘an act relative to gender identity on Massachusetts identification, establishing a non-binary gender identity option for state licenses, allowing applicants to choose “X” instead of male or female.

RSVP here!