The twenty-first century promises breakthrough opportunities for American women, who have led the recovery of our workforce participation rate.

Women, especially those in their late 20s and early 30s, have been responsible for 40 percent of the growth in our labor force since 2015.

Over the past year, women have represented more than 25 percent of net new non-managerial jobs in the private sector.

The U.S. Labor Department in March reported that:

• Women’s participation in the U.S. labor force has climbed since from 32 percent to 57 percent from World War II to 2016.

• Women have made notable gains in professional and managerial occupations.

• 75 percent of women work full time.

• Mothers are the sole earners for 40 percent of the households with children under 18 today, compared with 11 percent in 1960

The overall labor-participation rate — the percentage of the population that is either working or seeking work — of American civilians over the age of 16 has dropped from 67 percent in 2000 to 62.7 percent. Globalization and America’s aging population have caused much of this decline.

Why have women led an improvement in the participation rate?

American women have adapted well to technological changes. The percentage of women who are working in professional occupations has risen, in large part because they have surpassed men educationally.

Women are now a majority of college graduates, represent a majority of law students and constitute 50 percent of those entering medical school.

Another phenomenon is taking place at the other end of the wage spectrum.

Isabel Sawhill, of the Brookings Institution, a highly regarded, nonprofit public policy organization, offered this explanation of why women’s workforce participation has risen: Low-skilled job openings have been concentrated in service industries that do not attract men.

The U.S. Census Bureau does not project pay parity between men and women until 2052 and, today, women still suffer from a 20 percent pay gap. According to the Census Bureau, their earnings ratio has not changed much since 2007.

Yet higher earnings have encouraged more poorer women to seek employment. Median earnings are now growing by 4 percent annually among full-time employees with only a high-school diploma, compared with 2.9 percent for those with a bachelor’s degree.

One troubling spot for women is the construction industry, in which they represent only 8.9 percent of the total U.S. construction industry’s workers.

We must confront America’s historic value system. Until World War II, a working married woman engendered a stigma because it implied that her husband was an inadequate provider. Before World War II, 87 percent of school boards would not hire married women. Seventy percent of school boards would not retain a woman after she married.

Women’s early progress was attributable in part to their contributions to America’s war effort in World War II. With 10 million men serving in our armed forces, the country recruited women into manufacturing positions to meet production quotas.

Three-time Pulitzer Prize winner Thomas Friedman’s Book, “The World is Flat,” highlighted new competitive forces unleashed by globalization.

Friedman warned that all Americans must develop new technology skills to remain competitive.

Other countries, particularly in Europe, offer better programs for women ,such as family leave, subsidized child care and support for part-time work.

America’s female labor-force participation was sixth highest among 22 advanced countries studied by economists Francine Blau and Lawrence Kahn in 2013.

I recommend that we take policy steps that will make us No. 1.

Originally published in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune