E/CN.4/1995/78/Add.1 page 25 84. The poverty rate of families maintained by women is much higher than for other families, the rate of African American female householders with no husband present is higher than for their White counterparts - 50 per cent. Thirty-one per cent of Native American families were maintained by female heads of household. 58/ 85. The problem of sex-based wage discrimination has long been recognized as a major obstacle to the full economic equality of women. Women continue to suffer disproportionately from the general economic distress in the country. Despite some gains in the 1980s, based on the decline in the earning power of men, women still earn an average of 72 cents to the dollar earned by men. Moreover, women are often employed in part time or temporary jobs where they lack benefits, such as pensions and health insurance. 59/ 86. With respect to housing or the lack thereof, 15 per cent of homeless persons were women in 1988. However, by 1992, it is estimated that close to 30 per cent of the homeless population were women, with women of colour with children the fastest growing sector of the homeless population. In 1989, 77 per cent of all households living in conventional public housing were female headed. Again, a disproportionate number of women of colour were located in public housing. 87. Federal laws designed to protect women and girls from discrimination on the basis of sex in any educational programme that receives federal funds are not effective. Patterns of race and sex discrimination persist in the health care delivery system, from the exclusion of women of colour from important clinical drug trials to their under-representation in the preventive health care system. L. Racism and the environment 88. The Special Rapporteur received information from several organizations studying the proximity of areas where ethnic minorities and indigenous Indian American populations live to the sites of dangerous or toxic product depots and dumps. 89. After a thorough investigation, the Commission for Racial Justice of the United Church of Christ found that the racial factor was a decisive one in the choice of sites for toxic waste dumps. 60/ In particular, the Commission arrived at the following findings on the basis of information collected from official agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency and the General Accounting Office: "Race proved to be the most significant among variables tested in association with the location of commercial hazardous waste facilities. This represented a consistent national pattern. Communities with the greatest number of commercial hazardous waste facilities had the highest composition of racial and ethnic residents. In communities with two or more facilities or one of the nation’s five largest landfills, the average minority percentage of the population was more than three times that of communities without facilities (38 per cent vs. 12 per cent).