Women have steadily increased their representation in STEM and among leadership ranks across the corporate world in the past few decades, giving the impression that gender equity has been achieved. But experts — and the data — say otherwise.

This report explores the role of trust in whether and how inventors from historically underrepresented groups choose to engage in patenting, who they decide to collaborate with, and how their experiences with the process itself as well as working with others to navigate it can affect their level of trust and engagement.

Between 2014 and 2019, the number of women-owned businesses grew by 21%, far outpacing the rate of growth in the number of businesses overall (just 9%). This impressive growth was even more pronounced among businesses owned by women of color, with the number of women of color owned businesses growing at double the rate (43%), and, specifically, the number of African American/Black women-owned businesses increasing by 50%.

As COVID upended domestic life, women's rate of self-employment rose faster than the share of men in the sector.

At the start of the pandemic, self-employment rose for both women and men, who have a higher overall self-employment rate, according to an analysis of government data by Jessica Milli, an economist in Washington. But for men, self-employment has since returned to pre-pandemic levels, Milli found. Among women, it remained nine percent higher in February 2022 than two years prior.

Black women are staying in the workforce, but their need for paid leave continues to go unmet.

Increasing participation in invention and patenting by underrepresented groups would quadruple the number of American inventors, increase annual U.S. GDP by almost $1 trillion, and result in exciting new and different inventions.

What prevents women from reaching the highest rungs of the leadership ladder? This report seeks to answer this by taking a closer look at the representation of women in management and leadership positions across the United States—and the barriers that hold organizations back from achieving full gender and racial equity in leadership.