WOMEN IN THE WORKPLACE
From Care Giver to Breadwinner
Societies around the world have been male dominated throughout history. Men were the strong backbone of the nations. They were the military force and the work force. Women were considered frail and their primary responsibilities were to the household and family in order to breed the next generation of solider. For hundreds of years prior to the 1940's women were expected to stay at home with the family and be the primary care giver. It was instilled upon every young woman that they were supposed to grow up, get married, and have children with no mention of a career. This is demonstrated by the marriage age gap between men and women as depicted by the table below. Women often got married at a younger age than men. For a man to get married he needed to have an established career and be capable of supporting him and his new wife. It was very common that you would often see a man at the age of 40 and a woman in her late teens get married. This was considered the norm for many centuries. In affect women were not expected to obtain a high level of education.
In the 1940's, with the onset of World War II, large portions of the country's male population were drafted into military services. Leaving a large portion of women behind in the United States. Resources were needed to achieve victory and this meant production of guns, tanks, ships, airplanes, and much more. With all of the men overseas, the country counted on the women to work in the factories and keep things running. Forms of propaganda were used to get women to work in these factories. One of the most iconic forms was Rosie the Riveter.
When the war was won, men started to return home by the hundreds, which left them in need of jobs so they returned to work in the factories and women were once again subjected to return to the house to be the primary care giver of the family. However, this did not stay this way for long. Over the coming decades, women slowly started to attend college and universities all over the country. With a higher level of education, women started to obtain the desire to pursue careers.
There were several causes for women to want to pursue these careers. One of these reasons being that the cost of living per person was rising. It was becoming too expensive to live off of one person's paycheck in the household. Another reason for women to move into their own career paths is so that they could be independent and self-reliant. There are a lot of reasons to attribute to why more and more women are joining the workforce. Families can no longer be sustained off of one parent’s income and thus more money was needed for these families to live the lifestyle they were accustomed to. Another driving factor was the fact that marriage and divorce rates skyrocketed over the past few decades. This creates a lot of single parent households making that parent the primary care giver and breadwinner.
However, women’s independence has not come easy and there are still quite a few of equality divides. The main divides between men and women in the work place is job opportunity, pay, and opportunity for advancements. These divides are ways in which society discourages women from holding careers and becoming primary breadwinners.
When employers are searching though applicants for a job they will generally overlook women who are applying. There are laws that prevent employers from asking you if you are married or have children. They would want to ask these questions because in society women are depicted as the primary care giver. Which means if they have children that they would be more likely to take off work in order to care for her family. Employers see this as a very negative thing because they want someone that can work at all hours and not leave during key hours. This fact is backed up by the statistic that shows 50% of mothers in the work force have reported taking time off work to tend to a family member. Since it is illegal for them to fire someone that takes off for maternity leave they would rather avoid the problem all together. For the same work that men perform women are generally are compensated less then men. This is seen over and over again in the workplace.
In the past two decades, the United States economy has boomed. This fact is largely attributed to the fact that the number of women owed business has sky rocketed. Before, approximately 30% of all small privately owned business were run by women, however over the past few decades this number has switched and in 2007 there was a 50/50 relationship between male and female ran business. In a society that is run by capitalism, competition and the creation and growth of new business are encouraged. The United States is a Free Market economy and is derived by the creation of business. Without women in our workforce we will not be able to keep up with other nations in an economic standing.
Overall, throughout a woman’s career in total she can expect to make 23% less than a man would. Women are compensated less than men are for the same job. This compensation differences translate through their whole life and can have very adverse effects on their retirement. As it stands in the population over 75% of women have an 11.5% chance of being poor while men only have a 7% chance. As it is women are less likely to take part in certain career paths, which furthers the divide of equality. It is said that women are discouraged from entering into mathematical and hard science based fields. This would include physics and engineering primarily. Its not that women cant do these jobs its is that they a discouraged to enter these field based on their statistics. Based on the number of women currently in the field. However, in general in engineering class women generally out perform their male counter parts.
Since women have joined the workforce some laws have been made to improve their working condition such as sexual harassment laws and discrimination laws. We have come a far way from the past, however these laws are but a fraction of what needs to be done. Discrimination still takes place in the work field but not nearly as much as in the past. More and more women are being encouraged to enter the work force. The Regan administration was a larger driver of these laws and work place reforms.
