the woman's situation, that she is isolated. When a person on the work force is in an unpleasant work surrounding and they do not have enough inner contact with people, and work conditions are not agreeable, we consider that an employment problem and one must figure out a solution to it. Well, think in terms of the average woman who is isolated in her own apartment or home and then, think in terms of why depression ensues. Isolation, incidentally, is not always voluntary. It could be not only in the care of the young children, but it could be in the care of the sick or the elderly.

In all cases-I think we must not think just in terms of the very young-but in all cases a woman is told that she must adjust her life fully. In fact, if she doesn't she is made to feel guilty because; "Don't you love them, can't you care for them, they are your own." So she is made to feel guilty and she can't cope because, in fact, nobody even considers it a job. They are just considering it for life and so the reality, I believe, is that too many doctors are not thinking in terms of the woman in a job situation in which she is under strain and are too easy to dismiss her problems as the neurotic preoccupation of females who, somehow, they don't quite understand. So I think it is a problem of sex discrimination in medicine. I am no authority on it but believe me, I think there should be hearings. I also believe that this is one form of total oppression of females, is in their treatment in illness.

MS. OAKAR. Thank you.

Mr. BURTON. Thank you. First of all, I would like to apologize for having to leave the hearing. Unfortunately my Aviation Subcommittee is involved in something which requires my attention and must be resolved today. I would like to ask two questions. First, I would like to follow up on the tranquilizer issue. Is it solely an easy way out for the doctor? The doctor will prescribe them and keep on prescribing them or in fact, do the women, or men, continually seek the prescription? In other words, after the first prescription would the women then get dependent or "hooked" on it and return for refills of the prescription? Or would the doctor be the instigator, saying in effect: "You must keep taking your Leatrile or you'll die of cancer"? MS. SMEAL. Well, what comes first? Basically, our Woman and Health Committee has for quite a few years now done studies on tranquilizers and I think that it's quite informative. Incidentally, if you look in drug advertising books for doctors, their target is doctors, the most typical person in the advertisement is the famale, overwhelming numbers. I mean they advertise in a manner that these drugs are most typically to be used for females. Essentially, I believe that women are subject to more chronic illnesses for several reasons, not the least of which there is no compensatory time or disability insurance or way of taking off when you're sick. You know, we joke when you have the Alka Seltzer ad and everybody puts the thing on and moans but the mothers work through the illness anyway. It is not a joke. Essentially, too many women have no ability to take time off when they have an illness that could be minor and it becomes chronic. But I feel that it goes deeper than that and I feel it is literally in the sexist discriminatory attitudes of the profession, these of the females. I think it is part and parcel of what happens to the woman in midlife. She is to be there and to wait for others but her concerns are never primary. What she does is never considered of major importance.

Therefore, she can sort of be half alive at times and nobody will notice. The reality is if a person who is a male is having these major problems there is a worry that it will affect their ability to earn a living or a livelihood and, therefore, it is treated more serious and more dramatic. Women's illnesses are not treated as seriously and their complaints are those that people feel that they simply are not adjusting to their lot.

I wish I could just describe to you the typical kinds of response that a woman gets when she says that she is nervous. You know, if she has concerns over her child, for example-and they can be very serious concerns they are diminuized at herself being an overanxious mother. Everything that a woman does is diminuized and, therefore, it becomes an automatic response that you can treat this thing not quite as seriously.

Mr. BURTON. Would you have a study that can substantiate this tranquilizer problem or provide us with some statistics? We would be interested in substantiation that the doctors are sexually biased in their prescription of tranquilizers. For when a woman has a problem she is given a tranquilizer instead of maybe sent to a counselor or being helped to deal with problems.

Ms. SMEAL. I'm not familiar just off the top of my head, but we certainly will do a review of the very dramatic study which shows the advertising market that is being depicted by the manufacturers as primarily female.

Mr. BURTON. That is evidence of their intentions. But are you aware, or could you provide the subcommittee with some kind of a fairly hard evidence that women are overtranquilized for we may want to make that the subject matter of a hearing.

Ms. SMEAL. Immediately after this, I'll confer with our Woman and Health Committee and we will provide you with what we have. Mr. BURTON. I would appreciate that. I think it would be helpful. [Material not received at time of publication.]

Mr. BURTON. One last question. I have a friend who was recently widowed. She worked to put her husband through law school then became a housewife and mother. Her husband was assassinated. She is now a midlife woman who had a job as a legal secretary, I guess 25 years ago, and hasn't done anything since except be a mother, a housewife, and a politician's wife, and such. What would be the first thing or the most important thing someone like that should do?

Ms. SMEAL. The first thing is that she has to realize that she has done something since that time. In other words, I think that even your phrasing of the question, and I don't want to take off after it because it was a very common phrasing, indicates the problem. Women who are full-time homemakers are living and working every day and learning all kinds of skills. So what she has to do is literally analyze what she has done and write it up in business terms, so that she can sell herself. And to sell yourself, you must have a positive attitude about what you have done. The only way you can have a positive attitude about what you have done is to put it in terms other people can understand. So we would advise them to begin to think in terms of all the professional and all the different kinds of work opportunities and experience that they, indeed, have had during those 25 years. As a matter of fact, she is a far more valuable person, I am sure, than either she thinks or industry thinks.

Mr. BURTON. In other words, she should realize her self-value. Because I'm one of those who think the old Peggy Lee song about "I Am a Woman" that talked about what a housewife and mother could do compared to Helen Reddy's song "I am Woman," is just as much a tribute to strength of women in the country.

Ms. SMEAL. I am not familiar with that one.

Mr. BURTON. Well I mean that I agree to what you were saying. I appreciate everything she did as a housewife, and it was a hell of a lot more than a man could do, so I didn't mean to denigrate the

term.

Ms. SMEAL. No, I'm sure you didn't. That's why I didn't take off after it. But what I'm trying to say is that the first thing she has to realize is her self-worth and put it in economic terms. I think within 1 year or 2, if she allows her conscience to move, that she will be an active militant feminist and will be another fighter with all of us to change the system.

Mr. BURTON. But the real thing she should do is to sit down and understand that she is a person and does have a lot of skills, and has done a lot of things that do require both intelligence and whatever. Then she should translate that into a commercial type of situation. Ms. SMEAL. That is right, but I think eventually, if she is a statistical average, will also realize-I hope she's not alone-that she should join with others to change what is. Because I do not think you can have total person solutions under the given programs, and I really mean that. The reason I am here is because I do not think there are individual personal solutions without some fundamental, different, changing programs in our society as a whole. I think you must work for them.

Mr. BURTON. But don't you have to go through a psychological step before you can go out and join NOW, or the YWCA, or any group? In other words, you have to first deal with yourself and figure out where you are.

Ms. SMEAL. I think really and frankly one of the best things you could do for yourself is to realize that you are not the "lone ranger" in this.

Mr. BURTON. I'm aware of that

Ms. SMEAL. You should reach out to others because, in fact, they have been and they can help you. Not only can they help you, I think the first realization is that when you know that you are not alone, and that, in fact, together you can change it. You feel not only strongerMr. BURTON. But the first step has to be to realize that.

Ms. SMEAL. That's right. That's what I said.

Mr. BURTON. That's right.

MS. OAKAR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Grassley?
Mr. GRASSLEY. I have no questions.

Ms. OAKAR. Mr. Green?

Mr. GREEN. I understand that your organization has been doing some litigation on the question of pensions and the rights in a divorce situation to pensions. I am wondering whether, in the course of that, you found that any of the Federal legislation, particularly, is a problem in terms of asserting one spouse's rights where another spouse has got the full pension rights.

MS. SMEAL. Basically, we feel that the existing situation gives the female spouse very little rights in pension areas. As a matter of fact,

we support Congresswoman Schroeder's position on Federal pension plans of a proration. Actually, she would have it that you would have to be married for 20 years. I know she would like it different than that; she is suggesting this as a first step. But the reality is that we would like total proration and the recognition-and that's the whole part of my testimony of the homemaker's bill of rights, that of rights in the home. The recognition of reality is that half of those pensions are hers. Mr. GREEN. What sort of response have you been getting in the courts up to now?

Ms. SMEAL. Well, obviously right now under pension plans it is primarily the rights of the wage earner, the person whose name is on the check. Essentially, the reason why we are advocating such fundamental changes legally and in program-and, of course, the equal rights amendment-is because we are not very pleased with the legal status of females today.

Mr. GREEN. I see. I would just like to conclude by joining the gentlelady from Ohio in congratulating you and NOW on the very vigorous effort you waged here last year on behalf of the ERA extension and to wish you good luck out in the provinces.

MS. SMEAL. Thank you.

MS. OAKAR. Thank you very much and I know you will be getting an invitation to testify before the Social Security Task Force and the Unemployment Compensation Task Force.

Geraldine, I beg your pardon. Congresswoman Ferraro.

MS. FERRARO. Thank you. I was going to interrupt anyway because I really want to tell you that I'm actually delighted by your testimony today. I think one of the main things that has to be done is to educate our society in terms of the role of the homemaker. Being married with three children and running for office, I saw that need for an education, when I was first running. People would say: "How does your husband feel about it and how are your children going to adjust?" I once said to someone, "How many men have you asked that of when they were candidates for office?" I think that's a real problem with women getting back into the work force. One of the things that I have done about the problem is to introduce a displaced homemakers bill. We could use. the help of NOW with reference to getting it passed. That legislation might solve some of the problems, Mr. Chairman, of your friend, too. It would allow a tax credit for employers who hire a displaced homemaker. The first year credit would be $3,000 and the second year $1,500. But I want to refer specifically to your testimony with reference to your suggestion on page 9, item 4, the homemaker eligibility for unemployment compensation. The present unemployment compensation system is based on employers' contributions. How would you finance homemakers' unemployment benefits?

MS. SMEAL. I think that one of the major assumptions of this whole area of economic rights for homemakers has to be that she does have an income right now. There is a household income. And that society must recognize that she does have this legally and it is half hers. So, essentially, one of the ways to finance it would be through the person in her household whose income she is sharing and so that it is real. Just like she could be on his health insurance program; that she is a real part of an unemployment insurance program because, in fact, she does have stages of unemployment. That is one way of doing it.

Another way of doing it, frankly, is to think in terms of more nationalized programs in which a homemaker can participate in. That's one of the reasons that later on in the testimony we come out, for example, for a national retirement system. We think that, essentially, we must think of the homemaker as a worker who has a right to certain fringe benefits, and that we must design either national programs that she can participate in or, change the concept of her spouse having the sole rights to the wages and benefits of his work.

Ms. FERRARO. OK. That will be addressed when we look at the report, specifically with reference to social security.

Ms. SMEAL. That's right.

Ms. FERARRO. The other question I had, and it is a followup on the chairman's question which was with reference to the homemaker selling her skills when she went out into the work force again. Are you suggesting that she discuss her abilities in management? Is that the type thing you're talking about?

Ms. SMEAL. Yes. I think basically she has to analyze exactly what she has done and, in fact, how they relate to a business situation or a job she would like to pursue. And I don't think that she should be talked into or allow herself to be put into a situation of responding, "I have not worked." "What have you done for the last 25 years?" "I have not worked, I have just lived." I don't know what she is supposed to answer to that. She has got to answer exactly what she has done. I think, in fact, it is sex discrimination not to count those experiences as work experience.

Ms. FERRARO. Again it gets down to a matter of education and self-evaluation which is very, very important. Thank you very much for your testiminy.

Mr. BURTON [presiding]. No further questions? Thank you very much. Again, you will remember to send us whatever reports you can get from the Health Committee on the tranquilizer situation?

MS. SMEAL. Right, and I would like to just once again urge you to think about a bill of rights for homemakers and we certainly would be willing to work with you on it. We cannot say that at this monemt we have all the answers. Nobody could because we are embarking upon new territory but we certainly want us to embark and hope that we will be allies in that endeavor. Thank you.

Mr. BURTON. Thank you very much.

Mr. BURTON. The subcommittee seeks an overview of just what the Federal Government is doing with regard to the needs of mid-life women. For that overview, we look to our next expert witness, the Director of the Women's Bureau of the U.S. Department of Labor, Ms. Alexis Herman. May I please ask you to summarize your report. MS. HERMAN. As quickly as possible.

Mr. BURTON. Thank you. Please proceed.

[See appendix 1, p. 111 for Ms. Herman's prepared statement and attachments.]

STATEMENT OF ALEXIS HERMAN, DIRECTOR, WOMEN'S BUREAU, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR

MS. HERMAN. Before summarizing my statement for the record, I would like to correct a statement of the previous witness, Mr. Fromstein, who indicated that he would change the name of his or