When it seems like most of the news coming out about the economy is so-so at best and depressing at worst, it's nice to see an empowering piece of economic news.

A CNNMoney article shares the good news that as of Nov. 2011, women have experienced a better post-recession jobs recovery than men. Men have recovered 50 percent of the jobs they lost during the recession, while women have replaced 53 percent of their job losses. This is according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

In addition to recovering a higher percentage of jobs, the gap in number of jobs between the sexes has been greatly reduced as well. In Dec. 2007 there were 3.4 million more men working than women. By Nov. 2012, that number had been cut in half.

Why has this happened? The main reason is that some of the hardest-hit industries in the recession are male-dominated sectors, such as construction. Meanwhile, education and health services, which have a high concentration of women, did not experience the same amount of job cuts.

Now, what does this have to do with marketing to women? With the narrowing jobs gap, there should be a higher percentage of women working (at least compared to men), which means more money in the hands of women. Women already control upwards of 80 percent of purchasing power and that number could rise as the male-female ratio of the workforce approaches 50-50.

For now, though, we'll just be thankful that both sexes have gained at least half the jobs lost during the recession.

FletcherPR is a national communications firm that specializes in reaching women through the power of media. Headquartered in Knoxville, TN with staff in Nashville & Los Angeles, we are a full-service agency providing strategic public relations, social media and marketing communications services to our clients throughout the U.S.