After years of fighting to achieve equal employment opportunities, women are finally beginning to close the employment gap. The reasons, however, may be surprising.
While many across the country have experienced the backlash of the economic crisis, men have seen a far more drastic decrease in jobs than women, according to recent statistics.
The New York Times recently reported that due to the recession, 2.7 million men lost their jobs, while 82 percent fewer women did. There are several explanations for this discrepancy.
According to the economic consulting firm IHS Global Insight, employers in the health care and education sectors added 536,000 jobs in 2008. These are sectors where women are more likely to work. Simultaneously, manufacturing and construction -- sectors that are overwhelmingly male -- showed a sharp decline in job opportunities last year.
Also significant is the number of women working part-time: Part-time jobs are much more secure in a job market where cutting hours is a popular strategy. Because many more women work part-time than men do, their jobs appear much more secure.
As of last November, women held 49.1 percent of the nation's jobs, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In another assessment, including farm workers and the self-employed, women constituted 47.1 percent of the work force.
Freshman Jay Farber believes that the change is good for the economy. "[The closing of this gap] is good because it will allow our workforce to be more fully harnessed, which means that our economy can keep growing," he said.
Freshman Zach Daniels agreed. "I'm not a fan of Bronte," he said, "but it's good thing anyway that more women are entering the workplace."
While the recession has intensified the closing of employment gaps, female employment rates have been steadily rising for the past 40 years. In 1965, women held only approximately 30 percent of jobs in the United States.
According to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the closing of the employment gap is due to a combination of rising employment opportunities for women and declining ones for men. This trend isn't just in the United States -- worldwide, in most developing nations under the OECD's study, the gender gap has been closing appreciably over the past 40 years.
This change, according to the OECD, reflects changing social norms, lifestyles and family patterns. Also important, is the shifting of the workforce to a more service oriented -- rather than manufacturing or agricultural -- emphasis. This is classically where the female workforce had been concentrated greatest. Finally, the institutional change to a larger emphasis on part-time employment has had a large effect on this change.
These statistics have instilled optimism in some women's rights activists hoping for employment equality. Freshman Katie Kopel explained that such excitement should be met with reservations. "[The closing gender gap] should not be misinterpreted as a sign that women are treated equally in the hiring process or the workplace."
