In this week's edition, The Economist magazine makes note of a historic transformation that is quietly taking place with little notice -- within the next few months women will cross the 50 percent threshold and become the majority of the American workforce.

The change that has taken place in my lifetime is remarkable. When I was born in 1956 the expectation was that a woman should be home with the kids while her man earned a living. Some moms in our Providence neighborhood looked askance that my mom actually held a job as a receptionist/secretary for a car dealership. Those women who did enter the workforce were largely directed to a few occupations -- teaching, nursing, clerical or, if less educated, to repetitive manufacturing work or domestic service jobs. Even the college educated were expected to set aside their own professional ambitions.

Women are still vastly underrepresented in executive positions -- heading only 2 percent of America's largest corporations. And a pay gap for equal work remains, though it is steadily closing. My expectation is that in time more women will assume leadership roles and the pay gap will erode. Anyone who has attended academic awards ceremonies in recent years at any level of education can see that many girls appear more academically motivated than their male counterparts. There are now about 2.4 million more female than male university students in the U.S. And women have weathered the recession better, with men accounting for three of every four job losses.

Countries that have embraced the economic and academic empowerment of women will have a great competitive advantage over those societies, most particularly in the Arab world, that refuse to recognize that females deserve equal opportunities to succeed. Wasting half a population's talent is no way to compete and will invite increasing domestic unrest.

Unfortunately, some aspects of U.S. society have not changed to reflect the new reality. Child care remains a poorly paid occupation with little oversight when it should be a priority. Women who leave work for a few years to have and raise children (and men, for that matter) need greater assurances that they will be able to compete equally for opportunities when they return to the workforce. Businesses need to be more accommodating in utilizing new communication technology that can allow parents greater flexibility in getting their jobs done and meeting their family responsibilities. School summer vacations need to be shorter and the academic day longer, which would not only have educational benefits but dovetail far better with modern lifestyles. For many parents, summer vacation is a day-care nightmare, not a holiday.

But while societal changes are needed, the greatest change, women becoming fully integrated into the nation's workforce, deserves to be celebrated.