HerMoney Podcast Episode 329: A First Generation American On Finding Success

In 2020, Latina women had the highest initial unemployment rate of 20.2% and today, 1 million fewer Hispanic women are employed compared with pre-pandemic levels. Part of this is because Hispanic women were more likely to stop working due to childcare needs than Hispanic men, White women, or White men. 

Today, more than one-third of Latinas report finding it difficult to afford necessities such as food, and nearly a third have no rainy day funds saved in case of an emergency.  And of course we know that Hispanic women have long lagged in terms of earning power, making just 55 cents to the dollar when compared to white men. 

This is why when we talk about Latina women moving past COVID, we have to ensure it’s not just a return to normal, but a return to better than ever. Because we don’t want to go back — we want to go forward. Pre-pandemic, in 2019, Hispanic net worth stood at $36,100, compared to the median net worth for White families at $189,100. We need to ensure that Latina women are poised to reach new heights, and have the tools they need to succeed. 

We’re diving into all these complex topics this week with Pamela Zapata, a first-generation American, entrepreneur, and diversity and inclusion trailblazer. She is the founder and CEO of Society 18, an influencer management and consulting agency with a focus on multicultural content creators and digital strategy.

Listen in as Jean and Pamela discuss how she built a 7-figure business in less than a year, and what the day-to-day process was like for her, recruiting clients and building her business through word of mouth. For years, she’s been working towards pay equality for the BIPOC community, and she tells us what it’s been like working with creators of color, and companies that need to have diverse and inclusive brand campaigns that resonate with multicultural and multiethnic audiences. Every day, Pamela coaches entrepreneurs and influencers on how to charge their worth. She gives us some of her best tactics for women in any industry. 

“Women of color, Black and Brown creators, their rates were coming in way lower than their counterparts,” Pamela tells us. “And this was due to a lot of them just not understanding their value, not understanding what they could charge for certain scopes of work, and also just not having representation.” 

When it comes to money, we all have to speak up more in order to level the playing field: “Ask about money, talk about it. People don’t talk enough about money, especially women. We need to be vocal about it, because if we’re gonna get a seat at the table and we’re gonna be equal, we all need to make sure we’re leveling each other up,” Pamela says. 

She and Jean also dive into entrepreneurship, specifically the decline in Latina entrepreneurship during Covid. Pamela weighs in on what she thinks needs to be done to help women get back on their feet, and how we can address those stumbling blocks to build back to a more inclusive economy. We also address how listeners of other races can best serve as advocates and allies for the Latina community. 

In Mailbag, we tackle questions on creating a will when you have no children, and saving for retirement after an illness and a divorce. And in Thrive, gardening on the cheap.