The Cool Drop: The Measure of Progress
The current state of representation across business, leadership, and creativity.
I grew up in a family where most women were stay-at-home mothers or wives. The neighborhood where I spent my childhood was mostly white. At my high school on Chicago’s North Shore, most of the Black students came from a program shared with the South Side. As a kid, I was told our same-sex neighbors were “just friends living together,” not that they were in love.
We learned about systemic racism — but only in theory. As women, we weren’t told we couldn’t succeed, but we weren’t necessarily expected to.
I loved my family and the community that raised me, but between the quiet segregation of my city, the mixed messages of a religious upbringing, and the cultural biases passed down through generations, I knew I wanted to learn how to see beyond my own experience and to help build spaces that do the same.
We all have our own relationship with how we were raised and how we’ve chosen to see the world. But particularly on an election day, it feels fitting to think about representation — how far it’s come, and how much it still depends on who shows up.
C’est Cool continues to evolve into something I deeply love. Every week, I discover new founders and creatives building things that stop me in my tracks — ideas rooted in art, originality, and individual perspective. Being surrounded by people who identify with one or more of these communities can almost make it feel like we’ve arrived. But feeling is not fact.
This isn’t meant to sadden you — only to remind you why we’re here. Awareness precedes change.
So here are some facts worth knowing, and some research worth digging into.
Let’s start with some good news.
Globally, 1 in 3 businesses is female-owned.*
In 2024, 10% of new entrepreneurs identified as LGBTQ+ — a 50% increase from the year prior.
LGBTQ+-owned businesses collectively contribute an estimated $1.7 trillion to the US economy each year.*
Black-owned businesses grew nearly 30% from 2017 to 2022.*
Women launched nearly half of new startups in the U.S. in 2021 - up from 28% in 2019.*
Asian Americans, who make up just 6% of the U.S. population, represent 13% of STEM jobs and are behind 19% of high-impact patents.*
LGBTQ+ founders created 36% more jobs, 114% more patents, and 44% more exits — despite raising 16% less funding compared to the average founder.*
Progress is real, but it’s still uneven.
Women’s Representation and Progress
In the US, women working full-time earn about 82 cents for every dollar earned by men. The gap widens for women of color: Black women earn 36% less and Latinas 43% than white men. Globally, women earn about 20% less than men.*
Women make up almost half of entry-level jobs worldwide but only 25% of C-suite roles and 32% of senior leadership roles.*
For every 100 men who are promoted to manager, only 73 women of color — and just 54 Black women — receive the same promotion.*
Women own about 39% of all U.S. firms (12 million businesses), yet those firms account for only 9% of the workforce and 6% of total business revenue.*
As of mid-2025, only 55 Fortune 500 companies (11%) have a female CEO.* Women hold about one-third of Fortune 500 board seats, but women of color make up under 8% of directors.*
As of 2022, 22.6% of employer businesses in the U.S. were owned by people of color, despite representing 40% of the population. Nearly 80% of businesses are still white-owned.
Latinx Representation
Latinx entrepreneurs own 7.9% of employer firms but make up 18% of the U.S. population.*
Latinx-owned businesses are the fastest-growing segment of U.S. small business formation — up 44% from 2012–2022 — yet they receive less than 2% of venture capital funding annually.*
Only 6.8% of C-suite executives in the S&P 100 are Latinx.*
Asian & Pacific Islander Representation
Asian Americans’ share of CEO positions in S&P 500 has remained roughly 2% for the past decade.*
Even when adjusted for age, U.S.-born Asian American men with graduate degrees are 15% less likely to be in executive positions than white men with the same credentials.*
Black Representation
Only 8% of C-suite executives are Black, despite representing 12% of the US population. (More than 85% of Fortune 500 CEOs are white men.*)
Black workers earn 20% less than white workers in median hourly wages, and the gap has widened in recent decades.*
Between 2008 and 2022, Black American artists represented only ~2% of museum acquisitions and ~6% of exhibits.*
Queer Representation and Outcomes
As of 2023, only four Fortune 500 CEOs are openly LGBTQ+.*
Despite roughly 7% of US adults identifying as LGBTQ+, only 2.9% of SVPs and C-suite leaders are gay or bi-men and .6% are LGBTQ+ women.*
From 2000-2022, only .5% of $2.1T in US startup funding went to LGBTQ+ founders.*
Trans men and nonbinary or gender-nonconforming people earn 70 cents for every dollar the typical worker earns, while trans women earn 60 cents to that dollar.*
This data doesn’t represent every community or identity and it can’t capture the full spectrum of lived experience. But it offers a glimpse into how far we’ve come, and how much further we have to go.
Progress is happening but it’s not happening fast enough.
And that’s why we’re here: to celebrate creativity, to support founders, and to help shift the balance toward a world that’s more inclusive, more inspired, and more fair.
Thank you for being here.
<3 Kelly