I don’t know about you but I am sick of hearing about how sisters are last on the list when the discussion involves white men and women as well as black men. But a recent article in The American Prospect caught my eye. Besides the usual stats, what struck me was how sisters don’t seem to be getting ahead. Actually, an  argument actually can be made that we’re actually losing some ground. The truth is that we earn a mere .63 for every dollar earned by a white man. And nearly one million of us earn less than the minimum wage. Depressing huh?

We didn’t exactly slide from our position, it is more like we stood still while white women not only caught up, they surpassed us. We used to have a running start 30 years ago, when there were more black women in the work force than white women (with over half of us working versus 42% of white women).  Now 65% of sisters are in the (legitimate) work force while white women who work has grown to 60%.

But it is not just the sheer numbers that impact us, it is the positions we’re able to secure. Author Cecelia A. Conrad reveals what we’ve long suspected to be the true: it takes a sister with college degree far longer to secure her first job. And the reality is it is difficult for us to make up that time (and lost earning potential) so we spend many years of our careers simply trying to catch up.  All this stress then impacts our bodies—leading to obesity and other health issues.

The sad part of all this is that none of this is not part of the national conversation. So although we support most of the households in our communities, we’re still by and large invisible women. It is time we found our voices and yelled much louder about the absurdity of this situation—yes, even at the risk of being labeled angry black women.