When men and women working long hours is the norm, women’s careers stall

The 24/7 culture pits home against work in the battle over limited hours and creates discontent for women and men alike, write Irene Padavic, Robin J. Ely, and Erin M. Rei

Staying Or Switching: the Effect of Experience in Blue Collar Jobs on White Collar Women's Aspirations.

This dissertation contributes to the underst and ing of how occupational sex segregation is maintained by examining the effect of temporary employment in traditionally-male blue-collar jobs on the job aspirations of female white-collar workers. Regression analysis reveals that female white-collar employees of a large utility company who were transferred to power plants during a strike were less likely than their non-transferred female counterparts to consider a permanent transfer to such jobs. Questionnaire and interview data show that few elements of their current jobs impel white-collar women to leave them and provide many inducements to stay, such as high salaries, safe and comfortable work environments, and investments in training and experience in white-collar jobs-- and formed, at least partly, on-the-job in response to these jobs--further deter women from forsaking them for blue-collar plant work. Although there are many things to recommend power plant jobs--opportunities to use skills, high wages, autonomy, and rewards workers create at the point of production--few women strike workers were in positions to experience these rewards. Barriers they faced were the temporary nature of their employment, which involved being locked in and long hours; sex-segregated job assignments made by supervisors and plant managers; and paternalism and hostility from males in the plants. Because of these barriers, they were exposed to the potential drawbacks to plant work, such as shiftwork and male hostility on the job, but did not receive complete exposure to the positive features of blue-collar work. The relative calculus between blue- and white-collar jobs favored remaining in white-collar ones. I conclude that framing the question of the causes of occupational sex segregation as being either employee- or employer-driven is too narrow. Rather, there is a feedback between actual barriers and apparent preferences.Ph.D.Labor relationsUniversity of Michiganhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/161702/1/8801391.pd

Scheduling conflicts in the low-wage labor force: the case of Swedish and US women

By comparing the work-hours-related experiences of women in two countries that differ in their labor protections and their social-service provision—in other words, that differ in the extent to which neoliberalism holds sway—this manuscript sheds light on the implications of neoliberalism in terms of women’s working conditions.Specifically, we analyze the protections offered by each country that constrain employers’ ability to change work schedules unilaterally, on short notice, and arbitrarily; we analyze the constraints the states put on minimum pay; and we analyze the safety-net provisions in each country that enable workers to work for pay while raising a family and maintaining a decent living standard.We are in the process of conducting 30 in-depth interviews with low-wage working women in both countries, with 15 US and 4 Swedish interviews completed and analyzed so far and the remainder to be completed this spring.Findings indicate that Swedish women face fewer scheduling problems and, thanks to a more generous social-services system, face fewer negative effects stemming from scheduling and low wages.Neoliberalism presents a moral culture based on the concept of personal responsibility; at the ontological level, it presents a rejection of the social at any level larger than the immediate family. While Sweden is no utopia—its programs leave many people, particularly immigrants, in perilous working conditions, and its safety net has holes—it has withstood the neoliberal tide better than has the US

Changes in Racial and Gender Inequality since 1970

The decades following 1970 to the present were an important period because they marked an era in which measures such as Affirmative Action were introduced to improve opportunities for American minorities and women. Ironically, this also was a period when income inequality dramatically increased in the United States. We analyze Census data from 1970 to 2009 to assess whether inequality in the earnings received by women and minorities has changed in this period. We find a complicated set of results. Racial inequalities persist though to a lesser extent than they did four decades earlier. Asian workers in particular have seen improvements and a lessening of inequality relative to White workers. Gender inequality also persists, though more in some groups than others. Overall, the results of this study underscore the persistence of racial and gender inequality in the United States