Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo (L) delivers remarks after U.S. President-elect Joe Biden (R) announced her as his Commerce Secretary nominee at The Queen theater on January 08, 2021 in Wilmington, Delaware.

President-elect Joe Biden on Friday introduced key nominees for his economic and jobs team, including Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo for commerce secretary and Boston Mayor Marty Walsh for labor secretary.

Despite historic numbers for women, Congress continues to fall far short of gender balance.

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This week, Anne Hidalgo, the second-term Mayor of Paris, made history becoming the first French official fined for appointing too many women to management positions within the city administration. In 2018, Hidalgo named eleven women and five men to senior level positions within her administration; with women holding 69% of the positions, Hidalgo failed to adhere to the 2013 national law requiring no single gender make up more than 60% of senior officials.

By Alise Blūma and Kaycie Goral

The United States is failing women:

1. As of October 2020, the United States ranked 87th out of 193 countries in women's representation. Twenty years ago, we ranked 48th. 
2. As of January,  women will make up less than one-third of the U.S. Congress. 
3. And at our current rate of improvement, estimates suggest it will be more than a century before gender parity among our elected officials is achieved.

During the 2020 Congressional election, the campaign costs broke records once again, increasing from the $5.72 billion spent in 2018 to an estimated $7.52 billion in 2020; and, the cost of running as a non-incumbent woman was no different. A total of $443 million was spent by the 229 non-incumbent women candidates during the 2020 Congressional election cycle; only 27 have won and will be members of the 117th Congress.