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Ann Ruth Turkel's article on the empowerment of women presents both the theories and the realities central to the position that women find themselves in today. One of the harsh realities she discusses is the fact that women earn “79 cents to every dollar a man earns, even when the women are better educated.” As explained in her article, this means that a woman needs to work more than 10 hours to earn the same sum that a man earns in 8 hours. This is the same as having to work 2 hours for no pay. The specific point of emphasis is that the only single variable here is sex, and no amount of education, experience, or professional qualifications, will alter the inequity that women suffer in the workplace. Work for no pay under these circumstances is tantamount to slave labor. Thus, in spite of the feminist movement, slave labor for women still continues. It appears to be generally culturally accepted and there is little serious effort to change it.
We can learn a great deal from looking at the elements involved in this problem. It is important to note that psychic mechanisms for handling issues of power in women, as in men, do not develop in a vacuum but are shaped by cultural expectations and societal values. The empowerment of women is a topic which by its very nature demands that we transcend the limits of conventional psychoanalysis and embrace a broader view of the interplay between the developing psyche, and culture, politics, finance, biology, and the demands of the environment.
Turkel writes, “Mothering is a good training ground for leadership as well as a good metaphor to describe leadership behavior.” The intrapsychic and interpersonal strengths present in good mothering are very much the same as those found in good leadership, but women are not rewarded for this. Unfortunately, the role of the good mother can be a dangerous one for women in our society today. The mother-child dyad is an exploitative one. The mother risks her own life to give birth to the child.