Here is an excerpt from an article by Josh Bersin for LinkedIn Pulse during which he makes four key points while explaining why what’s good for women is good for business.

As you may or may not know, women now comprise a majority of students now enrolled in graduate degree programs in business, dental, law, medicine, and veterinary medicine. Also, they will soon comprise the majority enrolled in graduate degree programs in mathematics and the sciences. To read the complete article, check out others, and sign up for email alerts, please click here.

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This week http://shriverreport.org/ launched a groundbreaking report, A Woman’s Nation Pushes Back from the Brink, which describes the tremendous challenges women face in the US workforce. It makes the case that despite the promotion of high-profile women CEOs, there is still a significant wage and career gap for working women, leading to poverty, family crisis, and education problems with our children.

In particular, Maria Shriver’s personal essay, “Powerful and Powerless“, (click here for video) makes a very compelling case. You may be surprised to learn, for example, that 70% of low wage workers do not get sick leave and that women make up two-thirds of this population. 63% of women are now breadwinners and more than 40% are sole breadwinners. These are often the women who serve us in restaurants, teach our children, work behind the counter, or even work next to us in the office.

Much of the solution to this problem lies in the hands of employers.

In this article I’d like to help business leaders and HR managers understand why and how they can help address this issue. I will describe four pieces of research which clearly describe how and why we should improve the life of women at work. (Note this article is an extract from the original article published on The Shriver Report.)

[Here’s Bersin’s first point]

Point 1: Good Work and Good Wages Pay Off

The Shriver Report notes that women still take home between 9% and 30% less than men for similar jobs. Does this make business sense?

Well putting aside the possible discrimination issue, should business leaders always try to keep the cost of labor as low as possible? Much data says no. When we pay people low wages they do not invest in the job itself, turnover is often high, and engagement is low – with overall lower sales as a result.

Remember that people are not like machines: they are what we call an “appreciating asset.” When people are paid well they engage more deeply in the business and ultimately their value goes up.

Zeynep Ton, an adjunct profession at MIT, studied this issue in her new book The Good Jobs Strategy, which makes a compelling case for higher wages in retail.

She studied Costco, Trader Joe’s, QuikTrip, and Mercadona (the largest supermarket in Spain). Her research shows that these companies, which pay 150-200% higher wages than their competitors, deliver much greater profitability over time than their competitors. Her argument is that by investing in retail employees (by giving them training, autonomy, and what she calls “slack time”) these companies empower their people to spend more time with customers, provide better service, and sell more product.

A recent article in the New York Times article makes this point well. The author describes his frustrating trip to Ikea and points out that certain retailers make retail buying easy, and others make it hard. Those that make it easy seem to be more profitable and sustainable than the others.

Consider Costco. According to the Times article the company pays its workers $21 an hour, well above the $13 minimum wage. Why? Costco believes that this enables them to hire people who will learn the business, work harder, take more time with customers, and take responsibility for local store sales. This focus on a high value workforce, coupled with its simplified business model, has enabled Costco’s stock to outperform its retail competitors for years.

The point is simple: while it may appear that low wages save money, companies should seriously evaluate changing their thinking. A highly engaged employee who is well trained and ready to work is a huge competitive advantage.

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Bottom Line: Employers Can and Should Make a Difference

The Shriver Report study makes a compelling case. Too many women still find the workplace difficult, uninviting, or unrewarding. Too many women live in poverty. And even professional women (and men) struggle to balance the demands of their employer with the needs of their family.

My point is that this is not only hard on people, it’s also bad business. Paying people well, creating flexible working conditions, and creating an inclusive environment improves business performance. It creates a workplace of engaged, hard-working, collaborative people. And this in turn increases sales, customer service, and long term profitability.

A famous 2008 Harvard Business Review article “The Service Value Chain” proves that employee-centric companies like Southwest Airlines outperform their peers on a regular basis. This lesson, which was learned many years ago, needs to be re-learned today.

What’s good for people is always good for business. Think about these issues in your own work environment and ask yourself are we doing what’s best for our people and our customers? If you do I think you’ll find many opportunities to help women in your own work environment, and improve your bottom line as well.

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Here’s a direct link to the article.

Josh Bersin writes and researches corporate talent, learning, leadership, and HR best-practices around the world. He is Principal, Deloitte Consulting LLP and founder of Bersin by Deloitte. You can follow Josh here or on twitter josh_bersin or at his website.