Why the Numbers Are Wrong About Women’s Job Losses
Issue 2892 -August 10, 2026
The headline in The New Republic reads: “Terrible July Jobs Numbers Only Hurt Women. And the number of women who have left the workforce since January is more than double the number of men.”
You’ve probably heard it said that the numbers don’t lie.
But it’s also said that there are lies, damn lies, and statistics.
I thought about Dr. Avis Jones-DeWeever, profiled in The Movement blog this week. I have long admired her “Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead” mindset about advancing women’s careers. I can’t wait to hear her speak at Take The Lead’s Power Up Conference August 26.
In fact, I even made a slide with one of her powerful quotes and have been using it in my leadership training.
It annoys me no end that the numbers are always framed as “women leaving the workforce,” when that is blatantly a statistic that lies about at least two things:
Many women aren’t leaving voluntarily; about half are being pushed out, cut out, riffed without being offered opportunities for upskilling or outplacement.
More jobs held by women than by men, skewed toward women of color, have been eliminated by government cuts in jobs. That’s because women, skewed toward women of color, fill more of the entry level and clerical-type positions that were first to go in the DOGE cuts. And many companies integrate AI into their workforce in ways that bias against women, who again are more likely than men to be in nonmanagement or mid-management positions at risk of being eliminated as AI retools or removes the jobs they have held.
What Dr. Avis has done so brilliantly is to organize and energize those women to think differently about what their opportunities are to earn money and take care of their families.
A significant number of women leave the workforce, not because they quit working due to caregiving responsibilities, or because they have decided to become tradwives who don’t work outside the home, but because they have made a considered decision that the corporate culture isn’t working for them and they want to build their own businesses instead.
They are tired of the silent but sharp-edged biases, tired of being passed over for promotions when men with the same or less experience are moved ahead. And they are tired of carrying more than their share of the emotional load of workplace relationships and expectations, at the same time that they are carrying more than their fair share of the load at home.
But these women don’t quit working. Not by any means or measure. Instead, they opt for other ways to work.
Women like Lori Mihalich-Levin, a lawyer who was working in house at a trade association. She went back to work each time after she had her two children, who are now teenagers. Though she took parental leave both times, she got angry that so many resources were available for having babies, but not for her personal crisis she experienced with the change having children wrought in her own life.
“I was in a really dark spot after my second child,” Lori told me. “I took an online course of moms trying to find the abundance in motherhood instead of the challenges.”
The program helped her so much that she told her husband there should be a program for new moms struggling with the challenges of going back to work. He told her she should do something about it.
Fired up, she started a side gig.
She calls herself “a risk averse lawyer,” so she began slowly and methodically and launched her company Mindful Return over 18 months. She worked at a law firm 60% of the time while building the business, at first serving only individual women.
Then during the pandemic, she found that companies were feeling the need to provide this kind of service to new parents, men as well as women. Now, she has partnered with a dad to provide this service as a gender neutral benefit. She’s hoping to degender childcare and parental leave, and feels that would benefit everyone.
“Anger about injustice is motivating,” says Lori. I suspect Dr. Avis would say the same.
I know I have seen it many times in my career. But to make sustainable change, there must also be Aspirational energy—a vision of a better way.
To return to the wisdom of Dr. Avis Jones-DeWeever, “Each disruption became a catalyst for something bigger, something better, something that aligned more deeply with their true being…Sometimes the universe pushes you because you wouldn’t jump on your own.”
Dr. Avis, will be speaking at Take The Lead’s Power Up Conference 2026, Audacity: Leadership In Action. She’ll be on a panel of experts speaking on “Invest in Herself: Women, Money & Long-Term Success.” Joining her are Vernetra Gavin Hardy, Esq., Deputy City Attorney · City of Pasadena; Alexis Allen, Associate Financial Advisor · UBS; and Vanessa Coppes, Founder & CEO · BELLA Magazine, who I first met when she was reporter for the magazine, and now she has realized her dream of becoming the owner and publisher.
There will also be panels on caregiving, advocacy, AI, making the workplace work, women’s heath, and leadership, all focused on solutions.
Be in the room and in the conversation. Register now at www.thepowerupconference.com.
GLORIA FELDT is the Co-founder and President of Take The Lead, a motivational speaker, and a global expert in women’s leadership development and DEI for individuals and companies that want to build gender balance. She is a bestselling author of five books, most recently Intentioning: Sex, Power, Pandemics, and How Women Will Take The Lead for (Everyone’s) Good. Honored as Forbes 50 Over 50, and Former President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, she is a frequent media commentator. Learn more at www.gloriafeldt.com and www.taketheleadwomen.com. Find her @GloriaFeldt on all social media.