Assembly Select Committee on Select Committee on Latina Inequities

Is this thing on now?

Yeah.

Okay. Okay. Do it again. Good morning. Buenos Dias. Good morning. My name is Wendy Carrillo. I proudly represent Assembly District 52, which includes the beautiful communities of East Los Angeles, Northeast LA, Silver Lake, Echo Park, and half of the City of Glendale.

I want to welcome you all to our State Capitol, and for our first 2024 Assembly Select Committee on Latina Inequities, this informational hearing will focus on the economic status of Latinas in California, as Chair of the Select Committee. We established this Committee with the objective of providing a legislative venue for annual discussions on the challenges faced by Latinas in the State of California.

I want to thank our partners, HOPE, Hispanas Organized for Political Equality, proud HLI Alum, Class of 2009, and our committed partners, the California Civil Rights Department, the UCLA Latina Futures 2050 Lab, the Gender Equity Policy Institute, the California Commission on the Status of Women and Girls.

And I also want to thank my wonderful staff who worked diligently to put this Committee hearing together, starting with my Chief of Staff, Edmundo Cuevas, Natalee Vicencia, my Legislative Director, and Judith Gutierrez, my Communications Director. Thank you to them. We are all here because of their hard work.

I'm looking forward to an enlightening conversation today on HOPE's 2024 Economic Status of Latinas, a report that will focus on the persistent wage gap that Latina workers experience and policy recommendations to achieve economic parity for Latinas.

I'm saddened and melancholy feeling that this is actually my last term in the Assembly, and I've been reflecting on what I've done, my accomplishments, what I have focused on, what I have fought for. What have I spent my time on?

And I'm proud that we have secured funding through our state budget to increase opportunities with the HOPE Leadership Institute providing more Latinas from all walks of life the opportunity to learn political advocacy, agency, and grow their skill sets in our collective civic responsibility, as well as produce reports and data that advance the policy objectives of our Latina community, just to name a few things, as well as funding for diversity in Hollywood, the 2050 Latina Futures Lab, and so many other, just, where we spend our budget dollars is a lot about our values.

And I have recently been asked, what will your legacy be? How are you leaving the State Capitol? And how are you leaving your role in the Assembly? And I can't help but think of a line from Hamilton, the musical, which says, 'legacy? What is legacy? It's planting seeds in a garden you may never get to see.'

But we see that garden and we see its amazing opportunities and growth and the beauty that is the Latina community in the State of California and I am just honored to be able to be a part of that.

I also want to recognize, I see in the audience, my fellow HOPE sister, but also an instrumental part in all of the budget allocations that have supported Latinas in the State of California, and that's Genevieve Morelos, who was my consultant in Budget, who, while we had good times in Budget, were able to make so many strides.

So it's important to recognize the Latinas in the room, the Latinos that support our work. So let's begin. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, Latinos are the largest racial and ethnic group in the state, making up almost 40 percent of the state population in the 2020 Census.

And even then, there's discrepancies, because oftentimes Latinos in the race category identify as White and in the ethnicity category identify as Hispanic, other indigenous. So even then, we have work to do on data, and currently, Latinas make up close to 20 percent of the state's total population.

According to the HOPE's report we will be discussing today, Latinas face immense inequality in pay, poverty rates, educational attainment, and health outcomes. And today's hearing will consist of three panels with experts, panelists who have a deep understanding on the issues Latinas face in California.

Common themes will focus on exploring problems and solutions that allow us to address educational inequality, to support homeownership and other forms of economic mobility, to remove health care access barriers, and to provide equal access to opportunities.

With a solutions-based approach, our last panel is designed to facilitate a discussion on future policy recommendations that will serve as a baseline for the economic status of Latinas. We will allow time at the end of each panel for Members to ask questions, and lastly, at the conclusion of the agenda, there will be an opportunity for public comment.

I want to thank the Members of the Select Committee on Latina Inequities who are here this morning and others that will be joining throughout the next hour and a half, two hours, to provide commentary, and I want to open it up to the Members who are here to have any opening remarks if you would like.

Assembly Member Liz Ortega, representing Assembly District 20 and the new Labor and Employment Chair, excited to be here today. I want to thank our Chair Carrillo for leading this effort for many years and putting a voice on such an important issue, especially in the State of California, where Latinas are, you know, a majority of the state, but we're still a minority when it comes to policies and legislation and just representation.

So excited to be here today to listen to the panel, hear about new recommendations as we--you know, I continue, hopefully, the work that has was started by not just Assembly Member Carrillo, but many other Latinas who have sat here and made a huge difference. So thank you.

I want to thank Assembly Member Wendy Carrillo for chairing this Committee and always being--since I've been in the Legislature--always being a champion for equity and equality in a way that maybe not everybody always sees in the Legislature over the decades where there has not been as many Latinos here. My name is Tasha Boerner.

I am the Assembly Member that represents AD 77 from Carlsbad to Coronado on the coast. I used to represent La Vista and Oceanside, and so I saw, especially in my old district, what the Latina inequities were, especially during Covid.

So really appreciate listening to the panels and the reports and really finding out how we can, as a Legislature, continue the legacy of Assembly Member Carrillo in eliminating structural barriers, whether it's health inequities or wage inequities; there are so many that are listed in the report. So I really appreciate that and look forward to the conversation.

Hello. Assembly Member Juan Carrillo, representing the 39th Assembly District where over 65 percent of the population is of Latino Hispanic origin. I want to thank Chair Carrillo for putting this together. Looking forward to the conversations. I'm here to support, be able to facilitate even future discussions if necessary, if possible. And here to again learn from the study.

I have it here in front of me. Looking forward to the conversation. Having a Latina mother, Latina wife, and Latina daughter, Latina colleagues, and all of you, is really something that I look forward to keep empowering, and I look forward to the conversations. Thank you.

Thank you. So this is the report. The 2024 Economic Status of Latinas in California is significant step forward in policy discussions, and the most important part, I think for our colleagues in the Legislature, you don't have to be Latina to care about Latina issues. We are the majority of the state, and what impacts Latinas impacts everyone.

And so when you focus on Latinas, you're focusing on the entire State of California. So let's begin. I'd like to invite up to our first panel Helen Iris Torres, the CEO of HOPE, and Dr. Elsa Macias, the lead researcher and author of the 2024 Economic Status of Latina's Report. Welcome. Let's begin.

Hello. As stated, my name is Helen Iris Torres. I am the CEO of HOPE, Hispanas Organized for Political Equality, which is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization ensuring the political and economic parity of Latinas through leadership, advocacy, and education to benefit all communities and the status of women.

At HOPE, we build Latina community power by preparing and supporting Latinas as civic leaders, advocating for policy changes that champion equity for Latinas, and educating the public on the experiences and contributions Latinas make to our economy and our society.

As part of our commitment to elevating the Latina experience, we conduct research that ensures that Latinas are recognized for the contributions they're making to our society and identifies where the challenges persist in achieving economic and political parity for our communities. Today, we are very grateful to the Latina Inequities Committee, to all of our members.

Thank you for being here, for listening to us. I do want to spend a moment to say a special gratitude to Assemblywoman and the Chair, Wendy Carrillo. Not only is she a member of our organization, but she has been one of our strongest supporters and strongest advocates and a true voice for the Latina experience.

We very are very grateful to you. Thank you. Of course, we are here to talk about the Economic Status of Latinas California Report. This is the fourth edition of a series of reports that we started ten years ago, soon after the first--or the 2008 Recession. We thought it was really important to start reporting on how Latinas experienced the Recession and how do we come back from them and what the challenges Latinas are faced.

This report serves--this current report serves as a call to action for all policymakers, community leaders, and stakeholders to implement equitable solutions and provide targeted support to uplift Latinas in California. But by working together, we can create a more inclusive and prosperous future for all.

To give us a closer look at the data, it is my pleasure to introduce an incredible researcher, an extraordinary individual who has been with us for every one of our reports, and that's Dr. Elsa Macias, the lead researcher and author of our report.

Dr. Macias is a seasoned research analyst specializing in education technology, science education, and information technology policy. She has been instrumental, as I said, in producing all three of our past reports in our current report. So at this time, I'm pleasure to turn over the conversation to Dr. Macias.

Thank you, Helen, and thank you, Assembly Member Carrillo and all of you who are here today. I'm Elsa Macias, and I will be speaking on findings from this fourth California Economic Status of Latinas Report from HOPE. I'll just get right into it.

We examined national, state, and regional data on a variety of metrics, plus reports and briefs to understand how Latinas in the state are faring. Additionally, we conducted a series of interviews with Latinas from across the state and from various ages and backgrounds to get their input on how they're doing and how they could be better supported.

What we found is very uneven advancement in education, in small business ownership, and on several other areas with barriers hindering greater achievement and economic success. And I'll share just a few of the highlights. Next. So, as you've already heard, California has the largest Latino population--oh, that's really small. Can you see that? Sorry about that.

It has the largest Latino population in the nation at 40 percent, and that's on the left side, but also the highest concentration of Latinas in any state. Latinas make up nearly 20 percent of the population and 40 percent of all women. That means that one out of every five people in California is a Latina, and in some of the largest regions, such as in the Inland Empire, Fresno, Bakersfield, Merced, for instance, Latinas are well over 25 percent of the total population, and in some places, even higher. So that's over half of all women in some of the larger states are still Latinas.

So although the state experienced an overall decline in its population--I know many of us heard it on all of the media between 2020 and 2022--in fact, the Hispanic population remained essentially steady during that same period of time, with growth of about 350,000 people.

And as the state's population is reporting growth again this year, we expect that its Hispanic population will also increase even more. As a group, Latinas are young. They're 17.1 years younger than White women, and although, before the pandemic, they were in 2019, they were 17.4 years younger.

And similar population trends can be seen nationwide on the right side of this chart. Next. So Latinas are advancing economically, but they still face many disparities. And you'll hear about the wage gap in the next panel. Looking at household earnings, the median Latino household income in California is considerably lower than that of White households.

In 2022, the average Latino household income was only 73 percent of the average White household, and the Hispanic per capita income was only 41 percent of White per capita income. Next. The Latino homeownership rate increased by an impressive 3.7 percentage points between 2020 and 2022 as they purchased homes at above average rates and narrowed the gap with White, non-Hispanic homeowners. But their 2022 California homeownership rate was still 16 percentage points behind that of the White, non-Hispanic population.

Latino homeownership rates in the Inland Empire, where real estate is more affordable, stood at 61 percent, while it was only 35 percent in the Silicon Valley, where real estate costs are so much higher. Next. Home equity is a primary way to build wealth, and in fact, home equity and retirement accounts together make up 65 percent--sorry--made up 65 percent of household wealth in 2019, but only 40 percent of Latinos hold equity in their own homes, compared to 58 percent of White households. And only 41 percent of the state's Latino households hold retirement accounts, compared to 68 percent of White households.

And for those that do have retirement accounts, the typical value is 82,000 dollars lower than for those White households who hold retirement accounts. So next. So adding together lower homeownership rates, lower retirement account ownership rates, the wage gap, and lower levels of income generally, you end up with a substantial wealth gap that grows over time and over generations.

And in fact, the typical White household held nine times the wealth of the typical Latino household. Next. So Latinas are enthusiastic entrepreneurs, contributing to the state's economic engine by creating 150,000 jobs with a payroll of nearly six billion dollars. Latina-owned employer businesses increased by over 26 percent between 2018 and 2021, and represented nearly 12 percent of all women-owned employer businesses. Next. Latino educational attainment continues to improve despite many challenges. So two examples that I'll give here.

Although the 2023 Latina high school graduation rate of 87 percent dropped from the previous year, which was 88 percent, it nevertheless exceeded the state's overall graduation rate of 86 percent, and they narrowed the gap with White women. Another example is that the graduation rate--I'm sorry--yes, the graduation rate for Latina English learners, which is significantly lower, also showed improvement.

And the last example here--next--is Latinas 25 and over, with at least a bachelor's degree. That's people with a bachelor's degree, master's degree, professional degrees, PhDs, increased to 18.3 percent in 2022. However, that compares to 48 percent of White women 25 and older who have at least a bachelor's degree. And the gap between Latinas and White women has widened, did widened between 2018 and 2022. Next. Many health disparities were exacerbated by the effects of Covid-19, which was I think we've all heard about that.

In particular, what I'm going to highlight here is that life expectancy at birth declined over four years for Latinas, over three years for Black women, and at the height of the pandemic between 2019 and 2021, that compares with a decrease of 1.8 years for White, non-Hispanic women. So life expectancy is recovering, but only slowly.

So it's going to take a while to be able to recover from that. You know, I hate to be--that equates to a lot of lost lives, as you can imagine. Another issue is that Latina and Black women also face higher mortality rates and disparities in maternal care. Next. I'm sorry, next. Oh, I'm sorry. No, no, if you could go back. Sorry about that. So the uninsured rate for Latinas in California stood at the historic low of 8.8 percent in 2022. That's still higher than the total rate of 6.5 percent, but both are expected to rise as the pandemic era policies have been expiring.

And there are other issues that are at play here, so we'll have to wait and see what the data show us in the next year or two. Next. Bringing Latina perspectives to leadership roles ensures that California's diverse communities are fairly represented.

Many Latinas have the education, skills, and experience to fill leadership roles in elected office and in the corporate worlds, and yet, both statewide and nationally, the number of Latinas in these roles continues very low. Latina representation on the boards of publicly traded companies in California is abysmally low, at three percent, and gubernatorial appointments are also below parity. Next.

Progress in elected office has also been uneven since 2015. The number of Latinas elected to the U.S. House of Representatives stands at only four Latinas. That's actually a decrease, less than eight percent from what it was a couple of years ago. The number of Latinas--so there's also been a small improvement in statewide office in the past three years, with Latinas at parity among the state senators but not in the Assembly Members. Next.

The Latina interview respondents that we spoke to voiced concern that their low levels of financial literacy is limiting their ability to build wealth and to manage their retirement savings as well as they could. Nearly all of them worried about the impact of inflation on their household finances, but also on the economic health of their communities, and I want to underscore they were very concerned about their families.

They were very concerned about their friends in their community. Several of the people that we spoke to struggled with the high cost of living, with one in particular concerned about losing her home. Next. Another recurrent theme were the appeal and benefits of business ownership.

And more than in previous HOPE studies, the Latina interview respondents talked at length about the weight of financial obligations to their parents and/or to their children who were dependent on their contributions, and how helping them may be compromising their own retirements or their own ability to buy a house.

And finally, unlike in previous HOPE studies, where Latinas have expressed a very high degree of optimism about dealing with their current financial circumstances and their future prospects, the Latinas we interviewed last fall were only cautiously optimistic, but they nevertheless shared stories of resilience and perseverance and reliance on family and community. So I invite you to check out the report for more information, and thank you so much for your attention.

Thank you, Doctor Macias. I'd like to, I know that everyone maybe has a copy of the Executive summary, and I'd like to maybe talk about the disparities in population and representation and so on. The findings. California has the largest Hispanic population, Latino population, with the highest concentration of Latinas of any state.

In 2022, Latinas compromised 20% of the total population and 40% of all women. So my question is, as we look at the numbers, if you can go back to the slide of representation, Gubernatorial appointments, as well as I believe it was Executive c suite, what are some of the things that we can potentially work on to improve those numbers?

And I think oftentimes we find ourselves in conversations on a variety of different sectors of work, most impacted by Low wage workers as we then try to work our way to graduation levels, an increase of graduations with Latinas with graduate degrees. But yet when it comes to decision making, we're often not at the table.

So I'm curious as to your thoughts of what's possible and what can we do? Either Helen or Doctor Marcias, if you want to answer.

Absolutely. So there's a couple things. First of all, California has been leading in the conversation about women's representation and Latina representation or all women of color representation on corporate boards. As you may both know, that there was legislation mandating that corporate boards, publicly traded companies in California would have a percentage of women on their corporate boards.

That has now been somewhat repealed, as in being discussed in the courts. But for the first couple of years under that legislation, in all honesty, it was not helpful to Latinas. We saw more women of other, quite frankly, more white women being appointed to these corporate boards.

So we do know that there is an opportunity through legislation that could perhaps be helpful. I think there has to be a really understanding that corporate boards are run by private companies and they set how they set their recruitment for these corporate boards often are not in alignment where we find our Latinas right now.

So, for example, a lot of corporate boards want individuals that have run $1.0 billion budgets. We don't have too many Latinos that are running $1.0 billion budgets unless they're an elected office.

And you walk, you know, when you are termed out, then you should be considered for a corporate board because you've been having that say around how the allocation of dollars. So that's corporate boards and understanding that that is a private, that it's run by a private, by private industry with regulations, but still not mandated. Right?

So there's a lot more to be done there to discuss that regarding appointments in General. You know, the report that we recently did in January that looked at Gubernatorial appointments for just the year of 2023 was at 9%.

If you look at the adult population of Latinas, that is roughly around 14%, I believe is still not reaching parity.

There is a lot that we're doing at hope through our Latina appointments collaborative to make sure that Latinas are well aware of these opportunities, what that means to be representative of voice in their community, as well as what does that mean to ensure that they're at decision making places that sometimes often has budget or regulatory power, that they can ensure that we're being represented.

Hope does have a Bill, AB 782, to ensure that there is a consistent reporting under demographics, not only of ethnicity and gender, but also veteran status, geographic status, disability status, that we require that the Governor produces this report annually of the past commissioners so that we can have good data.

Everything that we're talking about today is based on data. If you don't have good data, you can't come up with good policy solutions. You don't know where the gaps are, and you don't know when to celebrate when you're reading a reteam parody.

So knowing that the corporate structure is very different and it's highly difficult to regulate, but we need to put highlight on that because of the power of the corporate sector, and then also knowing that we do have opportunities to ensure that we're holding each other accountable and making space for Latinas and appointments.

And correct me if I'm wrong, Helen, but this is the second time that Senator Monique Limon is pushing this Bill forward, which I'm a co author of. Thank you for that. It's the fourth time. Fourth time, and last time it was vetoed by the Governor.

The Governor has vetoed it for three times. We have been working with his office to ensure a couple of things. One, to ensure that, as you spoke, assemblywoman, about legacy, that the Administration sees this as an opportunity to leave legacy behind. This Governor, in many ways, has been doing incredible job of ensuring Latina First, right.

The first Latina Chief Justice of our Supreme Court here in California, the first Latina to head up the APA in California, and a lot more.

So it is really, truly about creating a legacy that we don't stop at the first and that we have opportunities with good data to ensure that we know how to move forward, forward and continue building that pipeline and ensuring not only Latinas, but all Californians see themselves in these commissions.

Well, I hope he or his staff are watching because we are continuously moving that policy forward and will continue to do so until it's signed, respectfully. Thank you. Did you have any comments?

Yeah, just, I had a question. Well, comments. You know, when I became labor and employment chair, one of the things that I decided to highlight and want to work on are the wage gap.

It's unfortunate that in the fourth largest or fifth largest economy, we still have women between the ages of 55 and 65 with zero savings in their account. And, you know, every year we celebrate or highlight Latina equal pay day. And I just get angry because we're not even close.

And so wondering, you know, you had one of your slides that talked about the financial literacy and business and economic. And to me, that's, you know, jobs.

So how would you, you know, what are some of your recommendations around this area on how we could do a better job of working with employers and educating our Latinas to have that, you know, that safety net, financial literacy, everything that would prepare us for the future?

First of all, assemblywoman, I want to point out that, you know, as you're the chair of labor, the incredible role that labor plays to uplift the wage gap for all Californians that are in certain sectors.

If it's the service sector, a couple things that, and I know you're having a panel, so I want to be respectful of the panel that's coming to talk about the wage gap. But we do believe that there is a strategy around the carrot and the stick.

And the carrot is what, right now, the first partner is leading with trying to get, as many organizations, not just corporations, hope, signed up to this, too, that we take a pledge that we will ensure pay equity in our workforce. So I think that is the carrot. Right? How do we lift that up?

And how do we reward corporations, businesses, unions, everyone, nonprofits, that are taking this up and really, truly fulfilling that pledge? The second is the stick.

How do we not only ensure that we have good data, that we're monitoring this, but then really call out bad players from either that there will be ways in which they perhaps don't get as good benefits, like from the tax cuts, or, you know, or that they get called out in a very public forum.

So there's ways that I think that we need to strategize. I think the goal with data is to ensure that we know, one, that we can prove what we experience every day in our community, hardworking individuals not being paid what they deserve.

So one is understanding that bringing that to light and then accounting and having these forums with our fellow Californians of how do we lift this up? How do we make a difference? So there should be a carrot and stick opportunity here.

And I look forward to hearing some of the other wise women that you're having to speak on that.

Well, thank you for that. And thank you, Doctor Macias and Helen, for the introduction of this report. So we passed out just the Executive summary, but the report itself is available on the Hope website as well as we're tweeting it out on our social media for those that are interested.

But it is definitely a lot more extensive with a lot more information. Additionally, on the QR code, outside of the hearing room, we have an easel board. You scan the QR code, you get the report directly onto your phone. So thank you for setting us up.

And we're gonna start with our second panel, a discussion around the Latina workers experience and the persistent wage gap that contributes to systemic barriers that continue to exist.

Joining us is Doctor Stephanie Puyes with the California Civil Rights Department, Sonia Diaz, co founder of the UCLA Latina Futures 2050 Lab, and Natalia Vega Barela, Director of policy and gender equity for the, I'm sorry. Natalia Vega Barela, Director of policy with the Gender Equity Policy Institute. As you settle in, let's begin. Thank you.

Good morning. So, can you hear me okay. All right, well, my thanks to Assemblymember Carrillo, the Committee chair and Members of the Committee, for inviting me today to speak on behalf of the California Civil Rights Department. Sure, yeah. How's that? Thank you.

So, my name is Stephanie Puyes, and I'm the workforce data officer at the California Civil Rights Department. And today I'll be sharing key findings from the department's pay data reporting program on the Latina pay gap in California.

So protecting Californians from unlawful discrimination and employment, including eliminating pay gaps for Latinas and other women of color, is a key focus for the civil rights Department. CRD accomplishes this by investigating and litigating violations of anti discrimination laws and employment.

Prior high impact resolutions by our Department include a $500,000 settlement for an English only lawsuit at pathways, a large health services provider, as well as a landmark $100 million settlement to resolve allegations of sex discrimination and harassment at riot games.

CRD also engages employers, employees, and the wide community through extensive outreach to promote civil rights and eliminate discrimination. We are proud to have implemented a language access plan that has served as a model for other agencies to provide equal and meaningful access to all in California.

CRD continues to work towards accomplishing its vision of a California free from discrimination. We recognize achieving pay equity in California requires partnerships between the state and employers. In 2020, the Legislature passed and the Governor signed SB 973, which instituted a statewide annual data collection for pay data reporting overseen by a CRD.

As required by law, private employers with at least 100 employees must submit data on the pay, hours worked, job category, race and ethnicity, and gender of employees on an annual basis. Beginning in 2023, following amendments made by SB 1162, employers are additionally required to file paid hated reports on workers hired through labor contractors.

Temporary workers are typically paid less than their permanent counterparts and lack access to creditable benefits and protections. This data will provide much needed insights on pay disparities by gender and race and ethnicity for temporary workers.

Through the pay data program, CRD encourages employers to conduct self assessments of pay disparities to promote voluntary compliance with equal pay and anti discrimination laws. Pay data collected through this program supports our efforts by the state to efficiently identify patterns in pay and allow for effective enforcement of equal pay and anti discrimination laws in the workplace.

For 2021, CRD collected pay data reports from tens of thousands of private employers with 100 or more employees representing over 7 million workers in California. So Latinas continue to face barriers to equal employment opportunities with implications for California's economy.

While Latinas make up nearly one in five workers in California, roughly equal in share to non Hispanic white men, Latinas remain overrepresented in Low wage work and underrepresented in the highest paid jobs and sectors. This has tremendous consequences for California's economy. In 2020 alone, over $85 billion were lost due to the Latina pay gap in California.

To illustrate these disparities, I will share results from our pay data for reporting year 2021. So we found that Latinas earned only $0.44 for every dollar a white man earned, and Latinas experienced the largest pay gap of all women by race and ethnicity.

Consistent with what we saw earlier in the Hope report, Latinas are also overrepresented in the lowest paid work, such as service work, and in labor positions. This has implications for Latinas work trajectories, as these jobs offer fewer opportunities for occupational mobility or wage growth.

Further, Latinas lacked representation in the highest paid jobs, such as executives, managers, and professionals. So recall that Latinas and white men make up equal shares of the workforce. So that's for every Latina, there's also a white man in the workforce, and yet only 6% of executives are Latina, while over 41% of executives are white men.

And for those few Latinas who make it into Executive roles, they earned only half of what their white male counterparts earned Latinas are also underrepresented in those sectors which offer the highest earnings. For example, in the information sector, average pay for all workers is over $186,000 a year.

Yet Latinas comprised only 6% of workers in this high paying sector and earned just over half of what white men earned. In the finance sector, where Latina representation was closer to their overall share in the workforce, Latinas earned only $0.38 for every dollar a white man earned.

This amounted to over $8 billion in lost earnings for Latinas in the financial sector alone. So we found that across sectors, the pay gap is a result of both occupational segregation, where Latinas are concentrated, and lower paying jobs, and pay discrimination, where Latinas are paid less than their white male counterparts in the same jobs.

And these findings highlight the large and persistent disparities Latinas continue to face. So the statute that created the pay data program that has employers report data to CRD in ways that can limit our ability to identify and measure these pay disparities. I'll highlight just two of these limitations today.

First, pay information is not reported by worker but instead is reported in one of 12 wide pay bands. This can veil actual differences in pay among individual employees working for the same employer in the same job. So consider a Latina worker is earning $43,000 a year.

The other is a white male worker earning $53,000 a year for the same employer. Because of how the data is measured, we would treat these two workers as having the same pay, thus obscuring the actual pay difference of $10,000, which is 25% of the Latina woman's in this hypothetical case, salary.

So for those workers reported in the highest pay band, which has no upper limit above $239,000 a year, in reporting year 2021, a worker earning $240,000 would be treated the same as a worker earning $500,000 or another who even earned $1.0 million each year.

So for those highest paid jobs highlighted earlier thinking Executive positions, for example, we may be underestimating already very large pay gaps for Latinas women and other workers of color. So second, employers report employees according to 10 very broad job categories which are set out in the statute. So take, for instance, professionals.

This is the largest job category in our data for California. So this broad category includes, on one end, dancers, artists, and writers, as well as lawyers, engineers, and surgeons. So regardless of their actual occupations, workers across disparate roles are lumped into the same job category.

The use of such broad categories impedes comparisons of workers in similar occupations as well as to labor statistics produced by federal agencies, which has more detailed occupation information. So, to echo what we heard from the last panel, better data is needed to augment CRD's enforcement's efforts.

This would include collecting an individual's actual pay and detailed occupation, which would enable more precise analysis of pay disparities for California's workers. More detailed data would improve state efforts to identify and enforce anti discrimination laws and allow the state to more accurately measure progress made in eliminating pay disparities among California's workers.

Well, thank you for the opportunity to share these insights from the pay data program with the Committee today. I look forward to continuing to work together to make meaningful progress towards closing the pay gap for Latinas, women and workers of color in California.

Thank you, Doctor Puyes. Really insightful information on the takeaway that I have from that is, there are equal amount of Latina workers to white men, yet the majority of the affluent positions across California go to the men and not the women.

And I think, assemblymember, that goes to your point on just the responsibility that the state has towards looking at those numbers.

And I'm really grateful that in the last year's budget and in policy conversations, the California Civil Rights Department, the creation of this Department, was a priority to the Legislature and to the Governor so that we have this data as we move forward. So thank you for that. This is our meatiest of the three panels.

So this panel will be about, approximately, about 20 minutes with the panelists, 10 minutes each, and then questions from the Members, myself, and others that may come in. So please proceed.

Thank you so much. Chair. My name is Sonia Diaz, and I am proud daughter of California, trained at our public schools in the state, and here in many ways, because of the mechanisms in the leadership of the California Legislature to put a spotlight on the needs of Latinas, the state's plurality of women.

I'm here to talk about the systemic barriers to Latina economic parity on behalf of the Latina Futures 2050 lab. Next. Wonderful. Latinas have been systematically overlooked in academia and policy discussions.

Despite their significant contributions to diverse communities, labor force and well being, Latinas are underrepresented in influential sectors, and Doctor pulas mentioned this, including law, media, business, science, technology, engineering, and math. Taking an intersectional approach to this, the Latina Futures 2050 lab responds to these persistent inequities that are experienced not only by Latinas, but other similarly situated populations.

In a landmark move, the California Latino Legislative caucuses, unseen Latinas Initiative, to which the chair was a Member, allocated $15 million to create and establish the Latina Futures labeling. Now this is a pioneering initiative that envisions a society where Latinas have an equal opportunity to lead and where everybody thrives. And I have to share that.

Assembly Member Ortega, you and I were at the meeting in October of 2021 for this very Select Committee on Latina inequities. And your ascent to a position of power and influence on behalf of Latinas and workers is a testament to the vision of our legislative colleagues.

One of the things that the Latina futures lab investigates and addresses is the experience of Latinas in the labor market, their engagement in civic leadership, and their well being.

This research was driven in part to the stark wage gap that we're here to discuss today and the severe underrepresentation in critical fields that determine the future of our state, our country, and this planet. Next.

This is really important because I'm sitting next to two scientists that are going to continue to reassert all of the data that is persistent and is troubling. But I think what I want to contribute is a framework to think about this in the application.

And so Latinas, who lack the wealth and education to weather economic shocks, were and are primarily responsible for household care and their families. They bore the brunt of pandemic induced job loss. They, more than any other racial ethnic group, left the labor force during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

And their labor force projections are what are driving and cementing the standing of this state as the world's fifth largest economy.

So systemic barriers to Latina economic parity, this concept of racial capitalism, it has to do with the fact that we rely on Latinas to do and do and do and do and make do with little, and that our remediation of gender inequity does not satisfy the unique contours of the experiences of women of color, Latinas, black women, indigenous women, AAPI women.

Well, what are the structures? So, occupational segregation, which Doctor potliss talked about, the fact that we're concentrated in Low wage, service sector industries that have Low pay, and in the face of that Low pay, the pay is unequal.

And there's also a disproportionate level of unpaid care work that Latinas do and do and do and do for their own households and the households of too many California families.

And so while we know that one in five Latino workers were unemployed during the COVID-19 pandemic, we also know, based on research at the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute, that Latinas spent less time working for pay in 2020 compared to 2019 and more time caring for their households or household Members.

This is a continuum of young people and of more mature adults. The household formation of Latinos in the United States is in opposite to that of non Hispanic white families, and that there's a whole person, whether it's a part of a child or another adult.

We call this multigenerational households, and that requires a lot of activities that some of us know all too familiar.

Taking care of people's appointments, transporting people to work or to school, cooking, cleaning, lots of things that are uncompensated within one's household but based on occupational segregation, are compensated for others in an unequal way, both in terms of wages and gender disparities in the pay gap and the exclusion purposefully of important labor security benefits.

Whether it's paid sick leave, it's the ability to get some federal or state benefits.

Here's a very stark fact, and again, the nuance of tailoring the intersections and the distinct differences facing the state's plurality population is essential for all legislators to understand, and that's that in 2020, Latinas spent quadruple, quadruple the time caring for their families and double the time maintaining their household compared to Latino men.

Now, one of the other things that's important in framing systemic barriers is COVID-19 relief and recovery was both exclusionary and temporary. We know that it was exclusionary on the onset of relief being tied to people's Social Security numbers and those households that were of mixed status being denied important CARES act benefit from the United States Congress.

We also know, through the leadership and dexterity of the California State Legislature, that there were a number of things that were forward expanding access to care, expanding unemployment benefits to those that were overlooked, and ultimately expanding health care access, which is essential.

These efforts, some of which that were pandemic, were temporary, meaning we saw families with young kids experiencing some of the lowest rates of child poverty in the history of contemporary society.

Now, after the government declared that there was no longer a public health emergency and those temporary relief and recovery efforts sunsetted, we now are stricken with some of the highest rates of child poverty. Why is this a Latina issue? Why is this a California issue? Why is this an American issue? Latinos are young. They're a youthful demographic.

Six out of 10 Latinos are millennial or younger. And the multigenerational household formation means that you have the interest and the needs of young people. And so when we are not taking care of young people, we're not just not taking care of our future, we're discriminating against Latinos and other similarly situated groups.

Next, through the support of the California State Legislature, the Latina Futures lab put together a dynamic convening of over 400 Latina leaders, lawyers, policymakers, featuring 70 experts on issues as wide ranging as reproductive justice, to access to telecommunications and technology, to the ban of affirmative action.

One of the things I want to lift up here is a panel for which this Committee can view on YouTube at the Chicano Studies Research center that featured the former chair of the Latino Legislative Caucus, assemblymember Lorena Gonzalez Fletcher, along with Doctor Leslie Green of Georgetown University's Law Center, Doctor Patrizia Campos of Cornell's Cornell University's center on the Worker Institute and a person that is really strong on narrative, Stacey Villalobos, a practicing attorney in the Bay Area.

And they talked about the COVID-19 impact on Latina workers. And I think some of the really important things that they talked about was that there are some new findings in hopeful optimism, and that comes with the expansion of fundamental social safety net benefits like healthcare, childcare, flexibility at work, data and accountability.

They also named that when we think about increasing the capacity of Latinas to walk through this society as equals, it requires major policy action on the part of comprehensive immigration reform at the federal level and the ability and support to unionize our workplaces.

Next slide this research was done by a team including my colleague Doctor Sylvia Gonzalez at UCLA as part of the Latina Futures lab. What you're looking at is a figure of the California female workforce by race, ethnicity, and birth cohort, also based on the same data year that Doctor Pulas was sharing her own calculations, 2021 here.

The Latina workforce in California is large, and it's growing. There's currently more than 3.3 million Latina workers in the state among young workers. So the state's young workers, 16 to 44 years of age, Latinas outnumber women in every other major racial ethnic group.

And so the future of our economic position as a state, as a country is predicated on Latinas doing, doing now and well into the future. Now, because of the data and the persistent inequities, their purchasing power, their ability to influence decision making, their ability for social mobility is severely curtailed.

And so, though Latinas are expected to be a larger proportion of the workforce, the capacity to stay in that workforce is in peril.

The capacity of that workforce to have the same kind of impacts as today's workforce is incongruent because we are seeing a workforce that privileges non Hispanic white workers in a segregated labor force of professional and business occupations. Next slide.

My colleagues have talked about this and will continue to talk about this, but again, this is research from Doctor Sylvia Gonzalez. Latino workers earn the lowest medium wages, so here $17 per hour. This was lower than every other major racial ethnic group.

The fact that this was so Low for Latinas in a state where California has the narrowest wage gap of all states in the country is profound.

One of the things that is important, and we need to be clear about working age, Latina workers experience a large wage gap even after considering factors that determine pay like educational attainment, years of work experience, occupation and industry, and citizenship status can explain some of the gender differences, but the remaining gaps remain unexplained by these variables.

And like Doctor Pullés said, they're attributed to gender and racial discrimination. Now, Latina workers experience a large wage gap, especially if they have a college education.

Yep. Next. There are some important things to contextualize here, and I think that's the history. And the history here in California is that Latino workers have power, and they've increasingly joined forces with diverse groups of workers to transform society. We've seen this in the Justice for Janitors movement.

We've seen this in the integration of immigrant leadership in our labor unions, and we're most certainly seeing it with our young people. Now it's up to us to work collaboratively, based on this evidence, to demand and to enforce equal opportunities and wages.

Next. We're going to talk a little bit more about this in the next panel, but some of the concepts that are important, I think, for this Committee and the body at large is policy, so legislation implementation, so that's technocrats and bureaucracy and enforcement. That is both public enforcement and private enforcement.

And so while this Legislature in this state has continued to expand the social safety net and promote workers' rights while also trying to achieve civil rights and gender parity, there needs to be attention on three key areas that we'll discuss at length in a bit.

Supporting working age Latinas to reenter the workforce and maintain stable, quality employment with security benefits. Given the research on COVID 19's impact on Latina labor force participation, providing resources and mandating the flexibility for Latinas and their families when caretaking needs arise. This means paid sick leave.

This means really thinking through the opportunity to provide compensation and to weather storms. We as a state experience a lot of environmental crises. We also are not immune to things that are affecting our geopolitical landscape. And finally, I think there's a need to push for the enforcement of labor and employment laws, especially wage theft and gender discrimination. Next. Thank you so much.

Thank you for that. I know you paused when you said that Latinas with advanced degrees are actually the ones experience the stretches of the wage gap. I'd love to dive into that a little bit. A little bit more. Thank you for that. And I want to welcome to the dias Assembly Member Avelino Valencia. Welcome. Thank you for being a part of the Select Committee. Would you like to say a few words before we continue?

Thank you, Madam Chair. Buenas tardes, everyone. Happy to be here, in particular, as a proud son and husband to strong Latinas. It brings happiness to me just doing my part. I'm glad to be here when it comes to standing beside you to advocate in the advancement of this issue. So count me as an ally, and I look forward to progress and growth. Thank you.

Thank you. Let's continue with the presentation. Now we have Natalia Vega Varela, Director of Policy for the Gender Equity Policy Institute. You have 10 minutes.

Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for having me here. As an immigrant from Mexico City, I'm deeply passionate about the topic that I'll be discussing today. I'll be sharing some insights from our report, Double Disadvantage: Undocumented Women in the US. At Gender Equity Policy Institute, we chose to focus on undocumented women immigrants because we recognize that undocumented women's needs are often sidelined in the immigration debate.

Our goal was to shed light on their experiences and challenges, which are often overlooked, and I'm excited to share some key insights from this research that is from 2021. Next slide, please. So our 2023 report uses data from the American Community Survey from 2021 and data from the Department of Homeland Security to estimate the number of undocumented immigrants and undocumented women in the US. We focused on the US and the top four states with the highest undocumented population, California, Texas, Florida, and New York.

Overall, what we found is that there are about 5 million undocumented immigrant women living in the US. They raise over 5 million children while making vital contributions to our economy. 66% of them between the ages of 16 to 65 are either self-employed, in the labor force, or pursuing an education.

Yet they're facing significant barriers to economic opportunity, including low wages, lack of access to healthcare, and higher poverty rates than the rest of the population. Next. So let's dive into some of the key findings of the report where these disparities are evident. First, our important finding from our analysis is that the majority of undocumented women are Latinas.

A second important finding is that, and this is where the barriers are evident, is that they're often segregated into low wage occupations such as maids, housekeepers, cleaners, and childcare workers. And as a result, they're paid less than every major demographic group, they experience higher poverty rates than the rest of the population, and they're more likely to lack health insurance than women overall. A third finding is that we observe significant disparities among states.

So, overall, undocumented women living in California fare better than those living in Texas and Florida, with having higher incomes and experiencing lower poverty rates. For instance, undocumented women in California earn over $9,000 more annually compared to those living in Texas and Florida. Next slide, please.

Now, zooming into California, which is home to the largest undocumented immigration population in the US. Our estimates show that 900,000 undocumented women live in California, and majority of them are Latinas. They're mainly concentrated in Southern California and the Central Valley, as you can see in the map.

They have lived in the US around, on average, 15 years, and we estimated that 60,000 of them are self-employed and another 60,000 of them are enrolled in post-secondary school. Now, looking specifically at undocumented Latinas, we saw that they make vital contributions to the economy, to Californian economy, with 67% of them between the ages 16 to 65 being in the labor force, are either self-employed or pursuing education.

Now, similarly to our national estimates, we observed that maids and housekeepers is the most common occupation among undocumented Latinas, with 11% of them being in this occupation. Next slide, please. So, overall, in comparison with with the other four states, our analysis showed that women in California, undocumented women in California experienced remarkable improvements in economic security and well being. For instance, in 2021, they had the lowest poverty rate at 16% and the second lowest uninsurance rate. Now, these numbers are likely to change with the expansion of Medi-Cal.

Our analysis also showed that from 2015, their median income increased by 10%, the gender wage gap actually narrowed, and poverty rate dropped by five percentage points. And in health, health insurance actually improved up to 60%. So there have been improvements, but barriers remain. Next slide, please. So what are those barriers?

Well, similarly to our US analysis, we found that undocumented women in California also face occupational segregation and earn lower wages compared to any other major demographic group. Now, when we examined the wage gender gap, we noticed that, even among undocumented immigrants, undocumented women earn less than their male counterparts.

So, for example, they're earning only $0.87 for every dollar earned by undocumented men. Now, compare to men overall, they're earning $0.58 for every dollar paid to men overall and $0.44 for every dollar paid to white men. But gaps are even wider among the undocumented Latinas.

Undocumented Latinas earn only $0.83 for every dollar earned by undocumented Latinos, $0.46 for every dollar that men overall earn, and just $0.35 for every dollar paid to white men. So undocumented Latinas are experiencing significantly lower wages and are more vulnerable, even among undocumented women immigrants. Next slide, please.

Now, looking at the top five occupations among undocumented Latinos and Latinos, as mentioned before, maids and housekeeper cleaners is the top occupation, followed by agricultural workers, whereas undocumented Latinos, their top occupation is construction laborers and followed by agriculture workers. Delving into the wages that they're earning, we can clearly see the disparities. So in the top five occupations among undocumented Latinas, their wages range from $25,000 to $30,000 annually, whereas for their male counterparts, they're typically earning around ranging from $26,000 to $40,000 annually.

This discrepancy underscores the need for policies addressing economic disparities faced by undocumented women and undocumented Latinas, particularly in terms of occupational segregation and wage gaps. Next slide. And, with this, I close. State policies significantly influence the economic well being of undocumented women, as we can see in the data that I just showed. California's policies, such as expanding health insurance access, have notably have better outcomes for undocumented Latinas. Thank you.

Thank you for that. That was incredibly insightful. I'm wondering if you can go back to the slide where you had the map of the state.

Sure.

And whoever's managing the slides, and to just talk about where this slide here exactly. Love this lady and I think shows just the joy in her work and probably in her family and in her community. I represent Los Angeles County, and I see it's one of the darker.

That picture was from Cinco De Mayo in Los Angeles.

Placita Olvera in my district. Yeah. I recognize the lamps in the back. But to the Central Valley point, I imagine a lot of potential farm workers and agricultural workers, and in LA County, a variety of different sectors of workers. And I'm just, I'm curious, and I'm sure maybe my colleague also has comments in terms of, there's been conversations with some more progressive Chambers of Commerce.

The LA Chamber of Commerce is one in particular that has wanted to create micro loans and micro opportunities for low wage undocumented workers and their ability to start their own business, but actually run through the programs and opportunities that the state has.

I'm curious if you have any insight on what would propel more women to, one, trust government and two, trust that there's a process for them to stabilize in a way that doesn't just, that isn't solely under the table workforce. And maybe that's something that all of you can share. But I remember looking at data when I was chairing a Budget Subcommitee on ITIN Holders. If we have, what is it?

There was a slide that you had that had the number of Latina undocumented workers in the State of California, yet we only have such a small percentage of ITIN taxpayers, which limits their ability to receive any type of benefit. Right. And so we're also working on how do we create access to unemployment benefits and additional benefits throughout the state. Curious if there's opportunities for growth in that area?

Yeah, definitely. So while we were making this report, we actually had the opportunity to talk to many self-employed undocumented Latinas living in Los Angeles. And as you said, they're not trusting that much. Like they're always in thinking that something could lead into maybe being in danger in terms of their immigration status.

So I would say that that would be like one first thing to do to make sure that you have the trust of these potential self-employers. Another one is that, and I saw this a lot in my own community, that they would love to be part of, like, a loan, but they also need the training for administration, for financial literacy. So that's something that potentially that could be also one of the first steps, rather than first providing the loans, first providing like, all the tools and knowledge so that they can actually take advantage of the potential loans.

And that would require us working with financial institutions to allow other documentation other than a California ID, potentially, to allow for micro loans and the start of micro enterprises, which has been challenging. Do you have any comments? Okay, I want to thank you ladies.

If there's no additional commentary on just some feedback in general, I want to thank you for the information. Is there? No. Okay. Thank you so much. We're going to move on to our last panel. Just very insightful, I think, data that drives our policy objectives. So again, I want to thank Dr. Pullés with the California Civil Rights Department and Ms. Vega Varela with the Gender Equity Policy Institute for your, for your contributions to today's conversation.

We're going to go on to our last panel, and at the end of this panel, we'll have an opportunity for public comment, the achieving economic parity for Latinas policy recommendations. And we're going to bring back to the panel Helen Iris Torres, the Chief Executive Officer for Hispanas Organized for Political Equality.

Sonja Diaz, you stay in the hot seat, here with UCLA Latina Futures, the 2050 Lab, and also the founding Director Emeritus of the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Institute. We appreciate all of your hard work and dedication in that space. And Dr. Rita Gallardo.

Rita Gallardo Good, Commissioner with the California Commission on the Status of Women and Girls. Welcome. And let's begin. Policy recommendations. Right. So we can have the data, we can have all the information, and we are moving policy forward. And we have, and we have made advancements, but there's still so much more to do. So let's get into it. Thank you.

Good morning, and thank you so much. It's an honor to be here as a Commissioner for the California Commission on the Status of Women, especially as a Latina, with my lens at the table. The California Commission on the Status of Women and Girls is an independent state agency that has worked for nearly 60 years to eliminate inequities in state law and practices that impact California women and girls. After decades of research, advocacy, and leadership, we at the Commission know one thing for certain.

The structures of our government, media, infrastructure, education, and the landscape of our economy were not originally built for women, especially Latinas, in mind. Our 17 member Commission includes three Assembly Members, three Senators, nine publicly appointed Members, one Superintendent of Public Instruction designee, and the California Labor Commissioner.

Unlike when we were founded in 1965, today's commissioners are all women and represent a diverse cross section of California's population. On the onset of the pandemic, we knew women were bearing the brunt of the impact due to the virus, both at work and in the home. The Commission invested funds in women specific research to examine the economic impact of COVID-19 on California women and girls, which produced the California Blueprint for Women's Pandemic Economic Recovery. Frontline and service sectors, which we call essential workers, were the first impacted.

In the many of these sectors, women are occupationally segregated, in some cases making up to 70% of particular industry's workforce. It is critical to understand that we lauded not just certain professions or service workers as essential, it was women who dominated those sectors as employees. Women are essential to the economy.

The pandemic added the estimated 36 years to the time it will take women to make the same amount as men, bringing the total to 135 years. The wage gaps we look at are highlighted the discrepancies of women of color, with the wage gap for Latinas sitting at in California. The intersection of race and gender is critical to understanding and promoting the economic well being of women, particularly in California, where Latinos and Latinas now represent almost 20% of the population compared to to see to less than 9% nationally, which is more than 7.3 million living in California.

And the Latina workforce in our state is large and growing, with more than 3.3 million Latino women working in California. Among young workers 16 to 44 years of age, Latinas outnumber women in other major racial and ethnic groups. Yet Latina workers earn the lowest median wages in the state.

In 2021, the median hourly wage for Latinas in California was only $17, lower than the wage of workers in other major racial and ethnic groups, and substantially lower than that of the white male counterpart, who earned a median of $35 per hour. The median full income for Latinas is $41,995, compared to $76,093 for white women.

Overall, Latinas earn the $0.44 cents per dollar earned by non-Hispanic white men in California, but Latinas also have bachelor degrees that are earned at $0.58 for every dollar of that of non-Hispanic white men with a similar level of education. This means that the typical Latina worker earned $0.56 less per dollar than a white worker, and a Latina with a bachelor's degree earned $0.42 less than per dollar. Even with considering factors determining pay, working age Latina workers experience a significant wage gap. Educational attainment, years of work, service, occupation, and industry, even our citizenship status can explain some of the gender equities.

Gender differences in pay, the remaining gaps not explained by these factors are in part attributed to gender and racial discrimination. Over a 40 year career, the difference between a California Latina woman earned and what white men earn cost the Latina woman $2.1 million.

However, as we evaluate these earnings by race and ethnicity, the gradual improvement in the earning gap in all of California women is due to the wage increases for white women and Asian women. The earning gap has stayed consistent for Latinas and increased for black women.

Collectively, women in California lose approximately 87 billion with B annually to the gender wage gap, and Latina women are burdened with a disproportionate share of that economic shortfall. Despite that, 25% of all women owned businesses in California are Latina owned and contribute more than 9 billion to the California economy every year.

We can no longer talk about the intersectionality, the intersectional issues of gender and race as a moral obligation expecting people to do the right thing. The economy of the future demands equity now. Latinas are needed not only to perform in the essential but Low wage workforces they dominate, but also to innovate and, ideally, implement and engineer, develop, and lead. California is home to more than 21,000 Latino owned businesses, or 24% of all Latino owned businesses in America.

Latina owned businesses have outpaced the revenue growth rates of Latino owned businesses and all white owned businesses in California. Yet Latino owned businesses generate less revenue from government and corporate contracts than Latino men owned businesses and all white owned businesses in California.

Latina owned businesses experience the most extended corporate contract negotiation periods, with 43% of them taking more than 12 months, compared to 26% among white women businesses. Latina entrepreneurs aren't just the backbone of California's economy. They have the potential to change the economic landscape of the entire state. If we fail to capitalize on this potential, we will miss our shot at building a more just and inclusive economy for all. Thank you for your time and consideration.

So building on that, and thank you so much. We want to concentrate our recommendations on a few things. When it comes to Latina small businesses, as you heard, their incredible contribution to our state, over 149,000 jobs are produced by Latina small businesses.

We also have another report that shows that if we were to ensure that every Latina sole proprietor would be able to bring on another employee, we would probably be adding closer to another 200,000 jobs into our state. So Latinas are doing the best they can with very little support.

The big thing we want to recommend when it comes to Latina small businesses is to look at the state and federal investments on women business centers, where their technical assistance really ensures that Latinas know how to take advantage of key federal dollars as well as state dollars, which serves as a vital resource for Latina small businesses.

Additionally, expanding financial opportunities such as loans tailored to accommodate the fluctuating capital costs due to inflation is essential. We have had a lot of testimonies from women coming to HOPE saying we bid on a contract at a certain time. Now, because of inflation, we can't even make money out of that contract.

There has to be ways in which we can have conversations to help Latina small businesses to compete against the bigger corporations and companies. Latino entrepreneurs often face unique challenges in assessing capital and offering they need to have flexible funding options and financial options. By investing both in the infrastructure, these small business centers, as well as financial instruments, we believe this will help Latinas continue in their growth as Latina entrepreneurs.

We also recommend that we improve current mechanisms to evaluate data of minority owned and women owned businesses. Policymakers should evaluate that this that the data is desegregated metrics for individual small businesses, including their annual revenue, number of employees, and demographics of small business owners.

Given the varied definitions of what is a small business within the state law and diverse array of programs available to them, improving on our current data system collection of data that stores this information would enable policymakers to accurately access the landscape and tailor each of efforts to address specific challenges faced by women business owners, specifically Latina business owners.

Regarding the wage gap, as mentioned already, we know that there is a tremendous wage gap between Latina and white men as well as the majority of our women counterparts. HOPE's Economic Status Report calls on two specific actions and that is one to ensure that there's one to establish a mechanism to reward those that companies, organizations, nonprofits who do take the Equal Pay Pledge as signatories. Since its launch, as mentioned, over 200 companies have signed onto this pledge.

Policymakers should explore opportunities to build upon this meaningful work and find ways to reward companies for completing their gender pay analysis. These companies have shown that they're willing to voluntarily implement more transparency in pay policies and undergo audits to address pay gaps. How do we continue to incentivize this behavior?

The second is to invest in workforce diversity programs to expand occupational opportunities for Latinas. Latinas experience unequal treatment in the workplace with fewer educational and career advancement opportunities that hinder our access to higher payer jobs.

State budget investments in programs that expand career pathways for Californians, such as apprenticeships and higher quality earn and learn programs, foster exposure opportunities for Latinas to step into fields that they are currently underrepresented and expand their economic mobility. Regarding education, we know this is an incredible tool.

Latinas comprise a substantial proportion of California school aged children and the college going population, foretelling their greater influence that they will wield for the state. Increasing access to post secondary institutions equips Latinas with skills and knowledge that are essential in today's competitive global economy.

Our Economic Status of Latinas Report also online strategies to increase college access, make it more affordable, and develop pathways that bridge college to career pathways. One such initiative that bridges the high school to college pathway is dual enrollment, which enables students to simultaneously earn college and, obviously, complete their high school requirements.

These programs enhance their economic readiness and helps demystify the college experience. Despite the benefits of dual enrollment programs, Latinas are underrepresented in most of these programs, and we need to ensure that we're removing any systematic barriers to be part of these programs. Lastly, I will end with the call around leadership.

One in every five Californians, as we know, identify as a Latina. Yet Latinas remain underrepresented in the US Senate. We do not have a Latina representative from California in our US Senate. We've never had a Latina as a statewide constitutional officer. Our underrepresentation extends to the influential appointments of boards and commissions, as we discussed earlier. But one highlight in particular, when it comes to our national resource boards, our water commissions, our different types of energy boards, we're less than 2% represented there.

So not only think about that economic imperative, but also where is our say about how our national resources are being protected and expanded? Increasingly, representation amplifying Latino voices in government is essential for fostering inclusive economic growth and addressing the unique challenges faced by Latinas.

The state overall must do more to increase pipelines for leadership for Latinas and that we're equally represented. The Select Committee on Latinas Inequalities, I'm sorry, is doing critical work. We thank you. Thank you. We feel like we're being heard and that we're not being overlooked.

The structural barriers to equality and the opportunity gaps faced by Latinas are great, and yet is going on to us coming together on behalf of not only ourselves in this room, but every Latina that does not have a voice right now in this room, we know that it is our responsibility to ensure that their voices are amplified, that our stories, our narratives are understood, and that we all take action to improve a better California for all, and that Latinas are very much part of that future. Thank you, Assembly Member Carillo, Assembly Member Ortega, for listening to us and giving us voice and for echoing and amplifying our stories.

So in terms of the short term, the data and evidence about the relief and recovery investments made by government are integral to making permanent. So when I talked about the temporal nature of them, let's go back.

Paid sick leave, 10 days, childcare, thinking about essential workers in new ways and benefits and services, whether it's addressing food insecurity, housing insecurity, healthcare access, the things in which our government did during the COVID-19 pandemic, in large part to lessen economic shocks, worked. They didn't work equally, but they worked.

And based on that evidence, how do we revisit, how do we institutionalize, and how do we narrowly tailor so that we're not exacerbating inequality? It's not that Latinas are stuck in time, but that they're getting closer to being full, equal actors in this society.

Right now, absent doing the things that the Legislature and the Federal Government did between 2020 and 2023, income inequality will continue to exacerbate. We are not holding constant.

We're retrogressing, and we're retrogressing in our most productive years, when we're in the labor force, when we are supporting households, and we're taking care of the society in ways that cannot be calculated. So that's short term. Go back to the things that worked, the things that work for children and families.

In terms of longer term, we need to be ambitious and rethink what we define as infrastructure and what's really serving our governmental interest in a quality of life, an inclusive and operating economy that is equitable and growing, and similarly a democracy, where our citizens and our constituents and neighbors trust that government is working for them, trust information.

So this is longer term, this is infrastructure, and all of these things are Latina issue. And Latinas have a big role to play if we scale. Helen provided some ideas about scaling entrepreneurs and small businesses. Yet Doctor Gallardo good acknowledged and reaffirmed the continuance of discrimination and outcomes. So what's our long term infrastructure?

Well, we know government can't do it alone. And we know that in a place like California, which is the story of Hollywood, the story of technology, the story of land acquisition, of history of wars, you name it. There's a world here where we have the opportunity to experiment, but we have the call to think bigger.

And right now we're being responsive and reactionary and in some ways married to a status quo that doesn't work. So what am I saying? What's the infrastructure that serves families and women in this state? Schools, community clinics? How do we fortify those as core democratic institutions so that they do more and are resourced to do more?

Providing legal services, behavioral and physical health, thinking about integrated civic engagement, having a strong role to play on the environment. There's a history of that in the State of California. We have measures that allocated money so that our schools could be greener in new construction. Now, what kind of infrastructure do we need for the 21st century?

It depends on who you ask. I think that one of the things that we need to think about is how our existing important societal actors are able to continue to be operating open and growing in the face of change, artificial intelligence and climate disasters.

How do we increase the fluency of our current slate of society and community pillars, minority and women owned small businesses, community clinics to keep up with climate change, but also technological change?

How do we increase and expand the products of our schools, community colleges, and California State universities to equip Latinos, Latinas, and all Californians with the type of training and education necessary to compete and take advantage of the society that's blossoming here in California?

I think that Helen pointed to carrots and sticks, and I had a Boss that said that all the time. I think that we need to be thinking about something new.

Okay, like, I loved you. I'm like, yes, what?

And this new thing is essentially redefining a goal by constricting the exacerbation of inequality. So if we need more doctors, we don't go to the University of California and give them more spaces for their medical class without contours.

Those contours should be, you are admitting a set of students that are community college graduates or California State University graduates. That is what this money is intended to do, and we are going to examine that. And your ability to continue to get the funding necessary is going to be predicated on that. That is a Latina strategy.

Then I think we still have infrastructure that does not exist in so many districts that are growth districts in terms of population. The Imperial Coachella Valley, the Inland Empire, the Central Valley. We don't have providers. We don't have the necessary legal, financial services, engineering, housing affordability, etcetera.

What do we have right now as a Legislature is thinking through California State University, community colleges, certain offices. How do you fortify and expand the capacity of those democratic institutions to provide things like housing, to provide things like climate relief from extreme heat, to think through the capacity to think about AI.

And so there's some business bets to make about infrastructure, and that infrastructure is repurposing what already exists to service the current and future population. How do you do that? I think the California State University should have a medical school in the Central Valley. And what is that middle? That is not a carrot and a stick.

There's a purpose. There's a governmental interest on behalf of this state to keep our residents healthy and productive. And so maybe that medical school has contours that are precise to that interest. Primary care, Ob gyn, emergency services. Right. We need people that are able to treat our residents and want to treat our residents.

We also need to be able to train them. And so having other systems in this 21st century do things that they haven't been empowered to do is the type of thinking that we need to do. You can give the carrot that's narrowly tailored, but you've got to start creating new, fertile interventions, and that requires ambition.

I think that you lean in on the governmental interest and workforce, on the environment, on technology, and on medicine. At the same time, you think through what do people that show up each and every day to go to work needle, they need financial advice. They need safe, habitable housing, they need lawyers.

Those are other types of infrastructure that we can discuss. But I think the path forward is thinking ambitious and thinking broad and recognizing that we're not holding constant. We're going backwards.

I love that. Yeah, it's beautiful.

Thank you for that. Where do you live and when are you running for office? Miss Diaz, is the question. Sorry, I have a. I got a coughing attack a bit. We're going to open it up to public comment. If there's public comment, I want to give my colleague an opportunity to have any remarks or questions before we close out.

I'm just in awe. I think I'll close where I started, which is, you know, we still have a lot of work to do. I'm incredibly grateful for the work that has been done with our leader here, Assembly Member Carrillo, and those who came before me, who, as was mentioned earlier, are the reason that I sit here today. And hopefully we'll continue the legacy of getting other latinas in these decision making rooms, because we can't be it if we can't see.

And I want to continue taking on the work and completely inspired by each and every one of you, but also, you know, as a Latina with red lipstick, infuriated by the fact that we continue to move forward and at the same time move backwards and interested in coming up with, you know, a grapefruit if it's not a characteristic.

I like that. So that we can continue to make advancements and think bigger as we are the largest demographic in the state and to not just act like it, but implement it and have the resources behind it so we're able to get to that vision. So thank you. Very grateful and look forward to continued conversations on this issue.

Thank you both so much. Thank you.

I would say, echoing that. Thank you. Assemblymember, what I'm hearing you say is that you might be interested in chairing this Select Committee next year, and obviously we want to continue doing the work. I think it was very impactful.

Doctor Gallardo and others that shared, we will lose in our lifetime, every Latina especially, I believe you said, those with degrees and in higher ed opportunities, an average of more than $2 million in our lifetime in the wage gap. And that's Latina women that have had the opportunity to go to college.

For Latina women that have not had that opportunity, that $2 million gap is much bigger. Right? I don't know about you, but I'm not okay with losing $2 million in my lifetime. And so it's definitely something to consider.

And I think when we have hearings like this and the data is in front of us, you can't, it's not about feelings. Right? It's about hard information, data that has the opportunity to change the way in which policy and legislation moves forward that ultimately changes lives.

One of the challenging part about the work that we've done, and I've worked in the space of trying to create diversity and equity, is that California is the only state in the country that has banned affirmative action with Prop 209.

And so while there was huge movement forward with affirmative action, allowing for minorities, Latinos, African Americans, and others to have access to higher ed and have access to other opportunities that has been denied for decades now in the State of California, when we know we are one of the most diverse states in the nation, following Texas, Florida, New York, or alongside, I think we're probably second, if not first, at this point.

No, actually, nevermind. Let me correct the record. We are the most diverse state in the country based on information that has been shared today. With more Latinas at the forefront of that representation. And yet we lack parity on a variety of different segments in the workforce.

How we change that, I think, is critical and important, with policy recommendations, of being creative, of how we move towards issues of equity and parity while not violating the current California constitution. That does, we are not allowed to mandate diversity, and it hinders an opportunity for minorities, and Latinas in particular, to be able to move forward.

Not having opportunities to go into a C suite, moving policies that, you know, created equity in a corporate board, only for a judge to strike it down and say it's against the California Constitution to mandate that we all want to see something different. And so if the question I think ahead of the board, ahead of all of us as we move forward, is, how do we take it to the ballot box?

How do we change the California constitution to allow and go back to a place that has been taken away from us, that allows for legislation and policy to move forward with real equity and diversity measurements that allow for this data to be even more public and allows for us to be able to not only have a seat at the table, but, you know, actually create change for California.

And there's a quote that I love that says, California may not have been at the forefront of the founding of this nation, but it will certainly lead its future. And what that tells me is that it's Latinas that will lead its future. And I find that incredibly inspiring.

So, thank you to all of our panelists today, all three of the participants. I would want to open it up to any public comment at this time, if there's any. The microphone is on the right.

Hi. Good afternoon, chair. And Senator Ortega. We really appreciate the opportunity to be here in this room and just have the opportunity to hear all of the statistics that was shared on behalf of all. All the panelists today. I'm here as myself as a Latina who grew up in the Inland Empire. I know I wear many hats, and I'm very proud to be in this space to help advance policy for a lot of folks across the state.

But honestly, it's really an opportunity for me to be here and hear all the things that people are doing to help advance latinas, but most importantly, thankful for the opportunity that you make space for us here in this capitol. Cause it's not often that we hear that.

It's not often that we walk around that we see Latinas in a room talking about the needs that we need to address in our communities. And something that I didn't get to see in the Inland Empire. I'm very proud to see Assembly Members Sabrina Cervantes lead and represent us, especially as a queer Latina.

But it's not often that if we don't see it, we don't think we can be it. And now, as someone who has a small business, I do see a lot of the economics disparities for other Latinas who are like me, who want to advance other policies and grow.

So thank you so much for the opportunity to be here and to speak and just to be around so many Latinas who are doing the work to advance policies for us. Thank you.

Thank you. Chair Carrillo and Assembly Member Ortega. I'm Veronica Tedriquez. I direct the Chicano Studies Research center at UCLA. It's a 55 year old center, and I am the first woman Director and I'm very proud to be here and excited.

I think we're going to do so much together with partners like Hope and others like the Translatina Coalition. There's various worker groups that were the domestic Workers alliance and other groups that we're working with across the state. I think we have a tremendous opportunity to tackle this wage gap.

It's huge, and as we know from the panelists, it varies across the different segments of our diverse population. And because of that, together we're committed. UCLA and our partners are committed to figuring out solutions to various multifaceted solutions to addressing that wage gap.

Our vision at the Latina Futures 2050 lab is to have equity for Latinas by 2050. We have to think boldly. And so what this means for us at the research lab, it means doing research on childcare workers. 78% of childcare workers in California are Latinas.

And if we address equity in wages for Latina childcare workers and provide affordable childcare for latinas and all mothers, we will go a long way in achieving equity. We need equity for our agricultural workers who feed us. Without them, we do not eat.

And women's health and economic viability of agriculture workers in particular, really needs to be addressed. It has strong implications for the workers well being and our own well being.

And so, you know, Sonia Diaz has done an incredible job at really bringing together the policymakers and others that I call the grass tops to also address this wage gap and access for lawyers, for our medical professionals, teachers and school administrators. So thank you so much.

Hello. Thank you so much. My name is Maria Morales. I'm policy Director for Hope, but also a proud daughter of immigrants, proud daughter of a single mother, Latina first generation college today. And I just want to thank you both for your leadership in creating this space that really centers our experience.

I think it heartens me that the call to action from here was not just about strategies on how to close equity gaps, but also the call for data to be able to track outcomes, to be able to track progress, and to be able to identify data driven strategies to really advance Latina.

So really looking forward to partnering with both of you and the Legislature to continue to advance this. So thank you so much.

Good afternoon, Chairwoman Carrillo and Assemblywoman Ortega. I wanted to express my gratitude for holding this hearing and just express the urgency of the conversations that are being had here.

I'm the Director of programs at Hope and a resident of the 61st Assembly District, and I have the privilege of working with young leaders and with Latina leaders of all generations, but particularly with young women. I'm seeing a disillusioned with the economy and with society and just the system in General and how they're being impacted.

And so I want to make sure that I highlight the importance of having sound public policy that is going to address some of the structural barriers that they see are impacting their lives, their inability to buy a home, pay equity. And so I want to thank you for your time and for your concern of the policies today.

Good afternoon, chair Carrillo and Assemblymember Ortega, thank you so much for holding this hearing. My name is Emily. I'm from the Los Angeles County region. I also work for hope as the community engagement manager.

And I want to thank you because, as you heard, Latinas represent only 9% of the boards and commissions that are appointed by the Governor, although Latinas make up 20% of the California population. And so without increased representation in these key roles, Latina voices are absent from critical decision making.

And then also, I think, echoing other people's sentiments just to empower the younger generation of Latinas, it's important to see Latinas in these positions of power. So thank you for holding this hearing. I think it's incredibly important to have this dialogue, and so I just want to thank you.

Hi. Good afternoon, Chair Woman Carillo and Committee Members. My name is Fernanda. I am from the City of Fresno, and I'm also a hope staffer. I wanted to say thank you so much for having this hearing for us today.

Today we learned, of course, that as of 2022, Latinas were paid only $0.42 on the dollar of our white, non-Hispanic male part partners. And in 2023, we learned that Latinas made up only 9% of the Gubernatorial appointments. So thank you so much for letting us share that information and continue hearing our recommendations.

Good afternoon, Chair Carrillo. Committee Members, my name is Natalie Aguilar. I'm also a hope staffer. I come from originally Los Angeles County, but I was raised in San Diego County as well.

So coming from two out of the three largest populations with Latinas, and as a first generation college graduate with an advanced degree, I would just like to thank you for your time. And it really does take spaces like this today to bring to light key economic issues happening in our communities and among Latinas.

I hope that other Members of the Legislator learn about the unique challenges our community faces and the need for more viable data. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Chair Carrillo and Assembly Member Ortega. My name is Jasmine Contreras. I'm from La County and I also work with hope. I'm the community engagement coordinator and I just wanted to thank you all for today's hearing.

As someone who is a first generation college grad and first time homeowner in the US, within my family, I do realize how fortunate I am to be one of the few percentage of the Latinas who who are narrowing the gaps. But as this report shared, California does have the largest Latino population in the US.

And I was surprised to learn that one of every five people in California are Latinas. So we must ensure that these Latinas are not left behind. I do believe reports like this bring awareness to the work that still has to be done. So I just wanted to thank you all for your work and as you continue to advocate for us and fight for us, just striving for policies that continue to break down those barriers. Thank you.

Good afternoon. Chair Carrillo and Assembly Member Ortega. My name is Doctor Alma Castro. I am here as an HLI 2024 alum and also as a school board Member for Linwood Unified Assembly District 62. Thank you for creating this space of this very important conversation.

One item in the report that really stood out was the over 56%, over half of our Latino of our students in California, we have 6 million students that we serve, are Latino and really important to the conversation is our collaboration and our work together and advocating to break those barriers in education and PK 12 settings as well as higher education.

I know that we've made some great progress with the 18% of bachelor's degree, but just recently, another publishing from the UCLA policy Department identified only 1% of Latinas with a PhD degree. So we have work to do together. Thank you so much for your courageous leadership.

Hi, good afternoon. Xiomara Pena, Vice President of innovation and community engagement here at Hope. I just started with hope. I'll be celebrating a month next Friday.

I'm a longtime resident from the Los Angeles region and I just wanted to really acknowledge both of your leadership for bringing this space today, allowing us to shed light on the pressing matters at hand. I do want to just touch on one piece, which is this need around long term solutions.

Yes, we, our community right now, can no longer benefit from band aid approaches. For a long time, we've done what we can as a state to bring stakeholders together and do our best. But many of the solutions presented today do offer a path forward for those short term and long term needs that our communities have.

Narrative building and narrative change can only happen through a meaningful data. And so I just also want to thank you for your commitment to hope in allowing us the space to put together data that is very meaningful to shape the solutions that we need to benefit our community. Thank you so much.

Hi, good afternoon. Chair Carrillo as well as assemblymember Ortega. I just want to take the time again to everyone's appreciation for your continuous support on this initiative on empowering Latinas, not only in the state, but also in the Central Valley, as well as a first generation college graduate, proud daughter of immigrant parents, as well as Proud Central Valley resident, I am continuously still facing many barriers to succeed in my region, and it's efforts like this that really are able to lift one another within the Central Valley. So I urge you to continue these initiatives to bring more succession, not only to the estate, but Latinas, especially in the Kern County area. Thank you.

Hello. My name is Lupe Santoyo. I represent the Puente, Hope, Hayward community. I'm a high school counselor. This is my 18th year, and I feel really grateful being in this with many, many of us. You know, as I work with young people and families, financial stress is real. It's real all over the place.

And I feel that the more financial literacy and financial wealth we can build with our generations, the more we can really heal when we lay our family Members to rest. As we know, funeral expenses are even crazy, but ultimately be able to still financially invest in our education, in healthcare, et cetera. So thank you again for sharing space with us, for continuing to provide this space, and I look forward to continuing this work with you.

Thank you.

Buenas tardes, ladies. This is quite an honor. I didn't even know that this space existed on actually the Latina's inequities, so I moved the schedule around. Sorry, Helen, but this was critical because my name is Doctor Vanessa Montagnes. I'm first generation mexican American, the highest in my family to receive a doctorate.

And my space is housing and how to build that generational wealth through sustainable home ownership and living in California. We have a crisis. Not only are we paid less, but we don't have representation at all levels. So I want to say thank you, Hope. Thank you, Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo and Luz, for being that voice.

We need to be at the table. It's unacceptable to be paid 40 cents to the dollar. Nothing infuriates me more. And the higher you go up the corporate scale, because that's what I do. We have to be at the table at all time. If not, we're going to be on the menu, ladies. So we have to make that change. So thank you so much.

Thank you. So again, once again, thank you to everyone that participated today. Helen Torres, the CEO of Hispanas organized for political equality. Doctor Elsa Macias, the lead researcher and author of the 2024 economic Status of Latinas Report. Doctor Stephanie Puyes, with the California Civil Rights Department.

Sonia Diaz, co founder of the UCLA Latina Futures 2050 lab and Natalie Vega Barela, the Director of policy for the Gender Equity Policy Institute. And lastly, Doctor Rita Gallardo, good Commissioner for the California Commission of the Status of Women and girls.

I'd like to thank, of course, my staff, and Maria Morales, with hope, also was very instrumental in helping us put this together. And Carol Gonzalez, who launched her new business as CEO of Latina Advocate, who made public comment today. So, thank you.

What you're seeing here today is two immigrant women, first generation college students, leading a conversation on the future of Latinas for the State of California. That is what representation looks like.

And so I want to thank my colleague and the chair of the Labor Committee for being here throughout the entire hearing, as well as the Members of the Committee that were able to be here throughout the day.

And I know others have been getting texts about others that are watching and coming in and out of other committees as well. So again, thank you to all of you. What's important about this hearing? It is now state record. It is state record that this conversation happened in this building.

And what we do forward and what we do to improve the lives of Latina women improves the lives of all families in the State of California. So again, thank you all. This hearing is adjourned.