San Francisco, CA – (January 8, 2023) The Women’s Transportation Seminar (WTS) San Francisco Bay Area Chapter has released its latest installment of a longitudinal study effort to benchmark women's leadership roles in the Bay Area transportation industry.

Initiated by the WTS Glass Ceiling Task Force in Fall 2010, this fifth report indicates that while some progress has been made toward increasing gender and racial diversity and representation within the transportation industry, challenges still exist to provide women with equitable opportunities to advance in the workplace. This study acknowledges these findings through a literature review, a survey of San Francisco Bay Area transportation employers and a series of group discussions, culminating in recommendations on programs and policies that could mitigate the proverbial glass ceiling effect on career advancement for women.

This report can be downloaded from the WTS San Francisco Bay Area Chapter website.

Information for this report was collected for 2022, two years since the COVID-19 pandemic. While the pandemic created tremendous challenges for women, it also led to several paradigm shifts that women have benefited from (e.g., flexible working arrangements). With this in mind, the Task Force supplemented its methodology to examine the lasting impacts of the pandemic on women working in transportation.

Key findings in the literature review revealed that while women bore the brunt of job losses early in the pandemic, they also returned to the workforce faster than their male counterparts. Women’s labor force participation rates have increased by 3.4 percent, as opposed to a 2.1 percent increase for men. Factors contributing to this return include rising costs, more flexible and accommodating work arrangements, and easing pandemic-related disruptions (e.g., school and daycare closures).

However, women are also leaving their companies in unprecedented numbers due to barriers to advancement, lack of recognition, and being overworked, and are demanding more opportunity, flexibility, and a better culture.

Women of color are disproportionately affected by economic and societal factors that have impacted their pay and earnings potential. Not only were they more likely to be laid off during the pandemic, but they were also more likely than their white peers to have been made redundant. In addition, women of color face layered barriers to advancement—they are penalized because of their race and then penalized again because of their gender.

Women continue to be underrepresented in management roles. Based on an analysis of 2019 Census Bureau data, an estimated 42 percent of managers were women, which is less than the 48 percent of women in the workforce. The pay gap between men and women persists. Women earned 82 cents for every dollar that a man earned; Hispanic or Latina women earned 58 cents and Black women earned 63 cents for every dollar that a White man earned.

A lasting impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is a shift towards remote and hybrid working. While working remotely diminishes the opportunity for feedback from managers, colleagues, and clients for more junior staff, it provides flexibility that is especially important to women with caretaking responsibilities.

Fifty public and private Bay Area transportation organizations were invited to participate in the survey. The Task Force achieved a 64% response rate, with 53% of participants representing a public agency and 47% of participants representing a private employer.

Participants were asked to provide their organization’s Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) data reported for 2022, specifically the demographic information of their organization’s employees. In previous years, the percentage of female employees in managerial positions was less than 10%. In 2020 and 2022, the mode was 20% to 29%, indicating that the advancement of women to managerial positions has held steady over the last two years.

The Glass Ceiling Task Force offers the following recommendations and next steps to further promote the WTS mission in the advancement, recruitment, and retention of women in the industry moving forward:

1. Continue to track progress every two years.
2. Track progress and outcomes of WTS career development programs.
3. Identify programs and career development opportunities to help advance WOC in the workplace.
4. Develop and convene a steering committee (representing private and public sector leaders) to meet quarterly and discuss ways that employers can better support women in the workplace.
5. Support internal capacity building of other WTS chapters who wish to conduct similar studies.

Findings from the Glass Ceiling Initiatives since 2012 can also be viewed and downloaded from the WTS website.

About WTS San Francisco Chapter

WTS is an international organization dedicated to building the future of transportation through the global advancement of women. With over 6,500 members, including both women and men, WTS is turning the glass ceiling into a career portal through its professional programs, networking opportunities, and unparalleled access to industry and government leaders. For more information about the WTS San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, please visit https://www.wtsinternational.org/chapters/san-francisco.