Rural Women Migrate To Revive Cities

"The women attending local community meetings moved here from tiny mountain villages and worn-out mining towns, and now they are fashioning a modern metropolis out of whatever they have in hand."

"Women are leading the urban push, leaving the countryside at higher rates than men, lured in large part by domestic service jobs. They tend to gravitate to places like this: a sprawling expanse in a developing nation struggling to provide basic infrastructure."

"The former hamlet of El Alto is now larger than the neighboring capital city of La Paz. El Alto had a population of about 11,000 in 1950, exploded to about 400,000 people by the 1990s and could surpass the 1 million mark next year, according to city officials. The majority of houses lack indoor plumbing and sewer service. Collecting local taxes to pay for services is difficult because about 70 percent of the economy is off-the-books."