The state dropped to 50th in the nation on moving women toward full equality with men. Mississippi was at the bottom at 51st, according to a national report issued Tuesday, which examined all 50 states and the District of Columbia.

When the last report concerning women's political, economic, social and health issues was published in 2002, South Carolina actually had moved out of the bottom 10 states.

"The Status of Women in the States" is a biennial report from the Institute for Women's Policy Research in Washington, D.C. The institute is a nonprofit public policy research organization.

South Carolina earned Ds and D-minuses in women's political participation, employment and earnings, social and economic autonomy, reproductive rights and health and well-being.

South Carolina had the worst representation of women in state politics, with women making up just 9.4 percent of the state Legislature. The state has no women in Congress and only one woman in a statewide elected executive office, Education Superintendent Inez Tenenbaum.

"A lot of women are fearful of the very combative nature of running for public office," Tenenbaum said. Her own U.S. Senate race against Republican Jim DeMint was highly charged. She lost by a 54-44 margin.

One reason women aren't comfortable in the political process is that they aren't exposed to it, she said. "The more women are exposed, the more likely they are to get involved and run," she said.

It's no coincidence that the state's ranking has dropped since Gov. Mark Sanford cut funding last year to the Commission on Women, said Laura Woliver, a University of South Carolina political scientist.

Columbia College, a private women's college, has offered to raise $250,000 a year and take over the research and development duties of the commission.

The state's climate toward women is troubling, said state Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter, D-Orangeburg, one of 16 women in the 170-member General Assembly.

"Women are not nurtured or encouraged," Cobb-Hunter said. "Forget the glass ceiling, there's a glass floor."

Sanford's spokesman, Will Folks, said the partnership with Columbia College will assist the commission in reaching its goals while benefiting taxpayers. The state has made strides on issues such as domestic violence, Folks said.

"The governor will keep working to make the quality of life in South Carolina first rate for all citizens," Folks said.

In South Carolina, and much of the South, there is a culture that not only keeps women from being involved in politics but also from earning what they should, said Von Bakanic, associate professor of sociology at the College of Charleston.

The problems aren't limited to South Carolina. Nationally, women make less than men for doing the same jobs, and fewer women have college educations or own businesses. And what affects women affects families.

"The bottom line in all this is how it affects children," said Jennet Robinson Alterman, executive director of the Center for Women. "When you discriminate against a woman who has kids, you discriminate against the kids as well."

The Center for Women is a nonprofit group focused on helping women with professional and personal success. The top issues the center hears about are health care, health insurance, pay equity and family support, she said.

If a single mother is making 73 cents for every dollar her co-worker is making, she has to raise her children on less, Alterman said.

That, in turn, affects child care, health care and overall economic prosperity, she said.

South Carolina's median annual earnings for a woman employed full time, year round was $26,600, 73.1 percent of what men earn, according to the report. Nationally, women make about 76 cents on every dollar men earn.

While about 57 percent of South Carolina women are in the work force, less than 31 percent are in managerial or professional positions. That compares with 33.2 percent in managerial or professional positions nationally.

"Salary's just as important to women as it is to men," Bakanic said.

Men and women tend to be socialized into certain jobs, and the jobs that traditionally attracted women, such as nursing or teaching, tend to be the jobs that pay less, she said.

One approach to pay equity would be to rank jobs by the education and experience and set the pay scale by those qualifications. That would mean a truck driver and a secretary with similar education requirements would receive the same pay, Bakanic said.

Still, such an approach would require reducing the pay in traditionally male jobs or increasing the pay in traditionally female jobs, which would meet with resistance either way, she said.

Women still carry about 80 percent of the chores at home, even when they're working, Bakanic said. That means they are less likely to have time for the extra hours at work that lead to promotion.

"We have to have a shift where husbands and fathers do as much as wives and mothers to raise their families," she said.

The mental shift toward earning equity is a two-way street, Alterman said.

"It is up to us as a community to educate employers on the value of paying women on par with men," she said, but "women have to do a better job of negotiating for pay that is in line with their skills and experience."

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