Stalled Progress In the C-Suite
Women still only account for one-tenth of Fortune 500 CEOs.
America has reached an inflection point, TIME Magazine proudly declared.
Under the headline “Great Changes, New Chances,” the publication noted that women could now be anything they wanted: They could be “cops, judges, military officers, telephone linemen, cab drivers, pipefitter, editors, business executives—or mothers and housewives, but not quite the same subordinate creatures they were before.” Equality is the new reality, was the message writ large.
The year was 1975.
Today, nearly five decades later, the optimism underpinning that editorial seems tragically quaint—especially from the perspective of corporate America. Forty-nine years after TIME named “American Women” the “Man of the Year,” women are still a decided minority. Sure, they can be “business executives”—as long as there’s still a man in charge.
On Tuesday, Fortune published this year’s Fortune 500 ranking, the 70th iteration of the annual list of the largest corporations in the U.S, ranked by revenue—and therefore, arguably, by power. For the twelfth year in a row, Walmart tops the list. Amazon, Apple, the health insurance giant, UnitedHealth Group, and Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway round out the top five.
Of all of the companies that made the cut, a mere 10.4 percent are run by women: unchanged from last year. It’s further evidence of the argument that efforts to diversify the highest echelons of corporate America are stalling.
