Leaving Women Behind: Modern Families, Outdated Laws

Americans', and, in particular, women's, realities have changed dramatically since the heyday of federal labor and tax laws, and the laws haven't kept pace, the authors argue in this wonky book.. They survey the failings of Social Security, the welfare state, tax-exempt savings plans and other government-sponsored institutions; explain how the lack of child care, inflexible work hours and tax rates punish two-income couples and hold women back; and propose an array of reforms, many of which involve privatization or deregulation. Some of the book's suggestions-such as eliminating the estate tax or privatizing welfare programs-seem at best tangentially linked to women's problems, while the bullet points quickly become a bewildering tangle of details. After an introduction that seems geared to the general reader, the book becomes bogged down in the intricacies of, for instance, employee-sponsored benefits and self-insured healthcare. The authors, who include a former Halliburton executive and a Wall Street Journal editorial page writer, succeed in proving that conservatives can offer compelling solutions to women's issues. They don't, however, succeed in presenting those solutions in a reader-friendly format.