Top Ten Reasons to Celebrate 2020

Post date: Jun 18, 2018 11:48:40 PM

What is it? A Dual Celebration!

Women got the vote in 1920, with the passage of the 19th Amendment – 2020 is the 100^th anniversary, or centennial, of that momentous legislation. So, for the first 144 years of our country, women had no voice – no vote.

The League of Women Voters was formed in 1920—so it is also our 100^th birthday!

We are raising money and awareness for the coming celebration....

So, why get excited about the upcoming 2020 celebration?

Women COUNT. Women's Votes Count!

By the numbers,

1. There were 1,575,574 women in Iowa, as of 2016—that is 1,575,574 reasons to support a celebration of women getting the right to vote!

2. Women make up almost half of the population of Iowa (49%)

3. Women who are registered voters show up to vote! 72.5% reported voting in the 2016 election. Compare this to 69.7% of registered males.

4. Women are running for elected office in record numbers in 2018, with 98 women on the ballot.

5. Women have served in the Armed Forces in Iowa: over 12,226 women are veterans. This is 6.7% of the total veteran population.

6. Young women study hard and graduate: 93% of them graduated from High School in 2016; the graduation rate for young men was 89.5 in Iowa

7. Women make up 57.7% of total enrollment in Iowa’s universities and colleges in 2016.

8. Women aged 25 and over with an advanced degree number 98,815 – compare that with 96,105 men in Iowa.

9. Women are becoming a force in business, with 82,345 female-owned businesses as of 2012.

10. Women have some catching up to do, to truly be represented by our legislature, with only 22% of state legislators being women. Iowa saw its first congressional representative in 2014 and first female governor in 2017. Only 28.6 of statewide elected executive office holders were women in 2015.

http://www.iowadatacenter.org/Publications/women2018.pdf

Report from the Iowa Data Center, based on Census Data

Sources

http://wqad.com/2018/03/26/data-shows-record-number-of-women-in-iowa-seek-election-in-2018-majority-are-democrats/

Data shows 98 women in Iowa are expected to have their names on the ballot for the June 5 primary. That’s a 44 percent increase from when 68 women ran in the 2016 primary.