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![handle is hein.crs/crsaagu0001 and id is 1 raw text is: 96-86 E
Updated January 14, 2000
CRS Report for Congress
Received through the CRS Web
The Glass Ceiling: A Fact Sheet
Linda Levine
Specialist in Labor Economics
Domestic Social Policy Division
Women and minorities in senior management positions are underrepresented
compared to their fraction of total employment. The term glass ceiling has developed
to describe the barriers that women and minorities are thought to encounter as they
advance up the organizational ladder. This explanation for the relative scarcity of women
and minorities in upper management positions was explored by the U.S. Department of
Labor (DOL)1 and by the Glass Ceiling Commission.2 DOL's Office of Federal Contract
Compliance Programs continues to conduct the glass ceiling audits of government
contractors that it initiated in the mid-1990s.
Nontraditional Candidates for Management Jobs
Congressional interest in the issue of sex- or race-based employment inequities has
included equal opportunity to enter nontraditional occupations.' Nontraditional
occupations typically are defined as those in which certain groups are underrepresented
relative to their share of aggregate employment.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, women made up 47% of all
employed persons in 1999, and minorities (i.e., non-whites), 16%. In contrast, the
Commission's reports cited studies from earlier periods of Fortune 1000 industrial and
Fortune 500 service companies that showed 95%-97% of senior managers to be men, and
97% of male top executives to be white.
1 U.S. Department of Labor. A Report on the Glass Ceiling Initiative. Washington. U.S.
Government Printing Office, 1991; and Pipelines of Progress: A Status Report on the Glass
Ceiling. Washington. U.S. Government Printing Office, 1992.
2 The Commission was created by the Civil Rights Act of 1991, P.L. 102-166, Title II. Its 1995
reports (Good for Business: Making Full Use of the Nation's Human Capital and A Solid
Investment: Making Full Use of the Nation's Human Capital) may be obtained through the
Internet [http://www.ilr.cornell.edu], the U.S. Government Printing Office, or the National
Technical Information Service.
' P.L. 102-530 (Women in Apprenticeship and Nontraditional Occupations Act) and P.L. 102-235
(Nontraditional Employment for Women Act).
Congressional Research Service *° The Library of Congress](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.crs/crsaagu0001&div=1&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)