Women Are Now Equal as Victims of Poor Economy

[groovedaddy]

Across the country, women in their prime earning years, struggling with an unfriendly economy, are retreating from the work force, either permanently or for long stretches.

They had piled into jobs in growing numbers since the 1960s. But that stopped happening this decade, and as the nearly seven-year-old recovery gives way to hard times, the retreat is likely to accelerate.

Indeed, for the first time since the women’s movement came to life, an economic recovery has come and gone, and the percentage of women at work has fallen, not risen, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports. Each of the seven previous recoveries since 1960 ended with a greater percentage of women at work than when it began.

When economists first started noticing this trend two or three years ago, many suggested that the pullback from paid employment was a matter of the women themselves deciding to stay home — to raise children or because their husbands were doing well or because, more than men, they felt committed to running their households.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/22/business/22jobs.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

[Warpy]

1. When women get laid off from living wage jobs

and face the prospect of working for barely above minimum wage, they need to look at the costs of things like child care (not in the male equation), transportation, fast food on working days, better clothing to wear to work, and a dozen other expenses. Many married women realize that staying home and cooking from scratch and providing their own child care while wearing old clothes is far cheaper, enough so that earning a pittance at a dead end job simply isn't worth it. Their unpaid labor at home more than compensates for it. Those who need to earn something do so when the husband is home to make sure the kids don't burn the house down, working part time.

That's what's at work here, not any choice. The break even point between shit wages and unpaid labor is reached very soon.

[groovedaddy]

2. Some years ago I read an article that referred to the value of work done

by homemakers (typically women).
It calculated the number of hours work and the typical pay for the type of work done.
The study concluded that the value was more than $80,000 per year (I think I'm remembering that correctly). Whatever the exact number was, it was stunning.

[Warpy]

3. There is no sick time, no vacation days, and it doesn't count

toward Social Security. In addition, employers never recognize it as work nor do they recognize any of the skills a homemaker must develop, skills that can contribute greatly to her productivity at a job.

That means when a homemaker gets "fired," usually when a husband finds a younger wife, she has absolutely nothing to market and nothing to fall back upon.

[groovedaddy]

4. That sucks, big time! n.t

[Nobody]

5. You're right about that

No benefits, and you're always on duty 24/7/265(366 in leap years), plus you get blamed if anything at all goes wrong.

As a teenager I saw what a scam it seemed to be: unpaid support staff to working spouse and the statistic I saw for the value was something on the oder of 100K in the mid 1980s. When my mother was looking to get back into the work force, I told her to tell potential employers that she was a self-employed domestic engineer. She laughed and actually played for a while while she and I listed all of the things she did for the household other than cleaning things. We had a huge list and it's too bad I never wrote it down. It's one of the things I'd have kept forever.

All that being said: If you have kids, having a parent (shouldn't make that much difference which one) stay home caring for them can be a good thing. IF the parent who stays home really wants to AND IF that parent gets breaks. Frequent breaks which includes adult-only time. I have friends who are stay at homes and they make damn sure they get to unwind with only adults around so they can tell dirty jokes and let out all the bad language and bad habits they have to rein in around the kids.

In our culture, no woman can ever do the right thing. Whatever she does is wrong. See the Aesop's Fable of the man and his son taking a donkey to market and what happens when they listen to every busybody they encounter. Should have starred a woman and her daughter, it would be closer to reality. Random passers-by don't give unsolicited advice to men as often as they do to women. Or try to "help" us when we don't want or need it.

I can't tell you how many times I've been mowing the grass and some guy stops me, interrupts my work, and tells me how to do it better. But the most amusing was the guy who asked me if I needed help pushing 300 pounds of computers on a cart to shipping while I was dragging another cart with one computer on it. I was doing fine, but it looked awkward. He didn't listen when I said I got it, grabbed the big cart away from me and spilled all of the manuals on to the floor. I told him he could help NOW and then walked away to visit the ladies room, leaving him with the mess he created. Should have listened to me.