Family and Society

WORK AND FAMILIES

I. WOMEN IN PAID LABOR FORCE

· In 1948, ¼ of married women with school-aged children, and 1/10 of those with pre-school aged children, were in paid force

· In 2013, 73% of all married women with school-aged children, and 62% of those with pre-school aged children, were in paid labor force (census)

· Why more women in paid labor force?

· Service sector of economy has expanded – this consists of workers who provide personal services such as education, health care, communication, restaurant meals, legal representation, and so on

· As population moved from farms to cities, each generation had fewer children bc now kids cost money (instead of working the farm) – women went to work to make money for the family

· High divorce rate made it risky for married women to leave the paid labor force – low amount of child support payments that women receive make it necessary for women to rely on their own earning power

II. COMPARING MEN’S AND WOMEN’S PAID WORK EXPERIENCES

· Similarity: both men and women report they work for pay for the same reasons – economic necessity but also personal fulfillment

· Difference: second shift – term coined by Arlie Russell Hochschild 1989 – second shift refers to housework and child care – called second shift bc it is work that must be done after a day of paid work – herein lies the difference between men and women – men go to work, come home, are done – women go to work, come home, and have to start a whole second shift of work (cook dinner, do laundry, help kid with homework, and so on) – back in 1989 Hochschild did interviews and direct observation and time logs and found that women bore the brunt of the second shift – what about today? Bc we hear gender equality, 50-50, and so on – research shows that yes the gap has narrowed, but not as much or for the reasons many people think – recent studies that replicated Hochschild found that men do 39% of second shift and women do 61% -- gap has narrowed but not as much as people think – also gap has narrowed bc yes men are doing more, but (more significantly) women are doing less – that is, women have cut back their time on second shift more than men have increased their time on second shift – gap narrowed substantially between 1965 and 1998, but there has been little to no narrowing since then – in fact, the gap had widened slightly by the year 2012

· Exceptions to the research finding that women bear brunt of second shift

· Single-parent households, parent and also kids take on more of second shift

· Families where wife is breadwinner and husband is stay-at-home parent, findings vary

· Dual-earner families that show complicatedness of this issue (example: me and Greg)

· Gay and lesbian couples – see readings – research shows that gay and lesbian couples tend to be much more egalitarian than heterosexual couples – egalitarian means they tend to share much more equally the housework and child care responsibilities – why? Probably many reasons, but one main reason is that gay and lesbian couples, when in dual-earner family, tend to make on average similar income levels (bc people on average tend to date and marry within similar social class) – and since money can equal power (see later connection between second shift and gender pay gap), that means less of a power issue at home

III. CONSEQUENCES OF WOMEN DOING THE SECOND SHIFT

· Role overload = stressed out and exhausted when you have too many competing responsibilities – both men and women experience role overload, but women experience it especially because they are the ones bearing the brunt of the second shift – so when discussing second shift, women experience role overload

· Spillover = transfer of mood or behavior between paid work and home – that is, both men and women get stressed out and exhausted when their stress from paid work then transfers to home – example: man has bad day at work, he comes home and is now short-fused with his wife and kids – both men and women experience spillover, but men experience it especially because they are the ones that society still expects to be the primary breadwinner, even in dual-earner couples (see reading Gerson)

IV. WHY WOMEN DO MOST OF THE SECOND SHIFT

· Beliefs about gender are slow to change – although we talk gender equality, 50-50, in reality our society still considers housework and child care the responsibility and realm of women (reading Gerson) – example: 1950s good wife “vs” today

· Feminist theory says that women doing most of the second shift reinforces and expresses gender inequality – example: gender pay gap – women make less money for equal work – see example – sometimes connected to home, because money often equals power

V. GENDER PAY GAP

· Example

· Causes:

^ overt discrimination (illegal but happens)

^ comparable worth discrimination (men and women are segregated into different jobs – remember gender socialization like toys and high school career gender tracking – and men’s jobs pay more)

^ pregnancy discrimination (employers hesitant to hire or promote a women for fear she will get pregnant or is pregnant and will then want/need time off from work) – irony: research shows having a child is a benefit for men, bc employers view them as family man, reliable, hard worker, stable, needs to support family – but having a child is a liability for women

· manifestations of gender pay gap:

^ glass ceiling: women face barriers to upward mobility at work -- example

^ glass escalator: men are encouraged (pressured?) to move up and out of a “woman’s” profession – example

VI. WORK AND POLICY

· US has Family and Medical Leave Act, Bill Clinton 1993 – firms with more than 50 employees must allow new parents up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave (also medical reasons too) – in comparison, other industrialized nations provide parental leave with pay – see example