Effects of Women in the Workplace
During the times of World War II the massive exodus of young married- and marriage-age men to distant war shores placed them one continent away from their families. And throughout the war years, the family back home didn't remain static. In the second shift of the war effort, mothers were now taken out of the home and moved to the workplace. The absence of men who were away at war left a massive vacuum in the industrial force, which was now gearing up for war production. And within a relatively short span, women and mothers who had been briefly "emancipated" to the work place, as a patriotic duty, were also requested to return to their homemaker duties at war's end as a matter of demonstrating further patriotism.
But the men who returned from war were altered to various degrees by the carnage of a global war. While they eagerly returned to family and work, something had changed in America. These men became less involved with the family, and more involved with making up for lost time in securing a financial future for themselves and their families. And while mothers and girlfriends returned to more domestic roles, to various degrees they too had seen a part of life that left them with new questions, new perspectives, and sometimes, new resentments about their previously accepted gender roles. This questioning and resentment was most likely the predecessor of the "woman's movement of the 60s.
Some believe that the impact of WWII has been overlooked. Its introduction of women into a previously male-dominated work culture; the subsequent psychic antagonism between the returning soldier and returning homemaker, resulted in a weakening of the marriage bond that has had a tremendous impact on their offspring as well. Further evidence of the impact of this major societal revolution on the family, marriage, and fatherhood comes from the records of divorce rates in America in the 130-year span between 1870 and 1998. In 1870, the divorce rate was 3 percent, virtually non-existent. As the Industrial Revolution took hold, by 1930 the divorce rate had steadily escalated to a peak of 17 percent - a nearly 600 percent increase. At the end of the World War II, the divorce rate spiked to 30 percent and then leveled off to an average of 25 percent between 1950 and 1965. It was at this point - between 1965 and 1975 that the divorce rate doubled, and has remained fairly constant at about 50 percent up until the end of the twentieth century.
finally the opportune moment for individuals to build a stable family that previous decades of depression, war, and domestic conflicts had restricted. We see that this decade began with a considerable drop in divorce rates and rise in marriage rates, which is often assumed as the result of changed attitudes and values. However, this situation cannot be only just attributed to women’s
For the first time women were working in the industries of America. As husbands and fathers, sons and brothers shipped out to fight in Europe and the Pacific, millions of women marched into factories, offices, and military bases to work in paying jobs and in roles reserved for men in peacetime. Women were making a living that was not comparable to anything they had seen before. They were dependent on themselves; for once they could support the household. Most of the work in industry was related to the war, such as radios for airplanes and shells for guns. Peggy Terry, a young woman who worked at a shell-loading plant in Kentucky, tells of the money that was to be made from industrial work (108). “We made a fabulous sum of thirty-two dollars a week. To us that was an absolute miracle. Before that, we made nothing (108)." Sarah Killingsworth worked in a defense plant. " All I wanted to do was get in the factory, because they were payin more than what I'd been makin. Which was forty dollars a week, which was pretty good considering I'd been makin about twenty dollars a week. When I left Tennessee I was only makin two-fifty a week, so that was quite a jump (114)." Terry had never been able to provide for herself as she was able to during the war. " Now we'd have money to buy shoes and a dress and pay rent and get some food on the table. We were just happy to have work (108).” These women exemplify the turn around from the peacetime to wartime atmosphere on the home front. The depression had repressed them to poverty like living conditions. The war had enabled them to have what would be luxury as compared to life before.
...and the responsibility to be just as patriotic and dedicated as any other. When the war ended and the men returned, women weren’t required for the occupations, and this stirred a yearning in women to be once again sovereign, and perhaps the time set a scene for a path to complete gender integration and a women’s rights movement.
When the war started, women had to take over the jobs of men and they learned to be independent. These women exemplified the beginning of change. Coupled with enfranchisement and the increased popularity of birth control, women experienced a new liberation. When the men returned from the war they found competition from the newly liberated woman who did not want to settle for making a home (Melman 17). This new class of women exercised a freedom that shocked society.
The war engrained men to be the defenders of their nation. As they came home, that role spilled into their everyday lives. Men became the protectors of their home and family by working hard to put food on the table and a roof over their family’s heads. Men were criticized and their masculinity questioned by
When all the men were across the ocean fighting a war for world peace, the home front soon found itself in a shortage for workers. Before the war, women mostly depended on men for financial support. But with so many gone to battle, women had to go to work to support themselves. With patriotic spirit, women one by one stepped up to do a man's work with little pay, respect or recognition. Labor shortages provided a variety of jobs for women, who became street car conductors, railroad workers, and shipbuilders. Some women took over the farms, monitoring the crops and harvesting and taking care of livestock. Women, who had young children with nobody to help them, did what they could do to help too. They made such things for the soldiers overseas, such as flannel shirts, socks and scarves.
Yet, at the end of the war, the same ideas that encouraged women to accept new roles had an averse effect on women, encouraging them to leave the workforce. The patriotism promoted by propaganda in the 1940s, encouraged Americans to support the war effort and reinforced the existing patriarchal society. Propaganda's use of patriotism not only increased loyalty to America during the war, but also, increased loyalty to the traditional American patriarchal values held in society. Many factors influenced the changes in women’s employment. The change that occurred went through three major phases: the prewar period in the early 1940s, the war years from 1942-1944, and the post war years from around 1945-1949.
In every war the women had stepped up to try to help the men who were off to fight, but the more agrarian societies of the revolution, the War of 1812, the Civil War, and even World War I meant that most stepped up to do the work on the farm. In World War II, it was just as likely that the wives and mothers were stepping up to take a place in a factory as in the fields. While America was still primarily agrarian, the factories needed for warfare had brought the women to take their husband’s and son’s and boyfriend’s places. And while some women followed their husbands to the battlefront in the Civil War, and a few even enlisted as men, World War II brought a whole new experience as a huge war machine needed the men at the fronts for ...
American society today is different from our grandparents’ generation. The rising divorce rates, population growth in the suburbs, and the lives of women and mothers working outside the home marked the tremendous social changes in American society today. First of all, America has the highest divorce rate among western nations. Divorce rates increased after every major war, and decreased during the Post-World War II economic boom. The divorce rate has more than doubled since 1940, when there were two divorces for every 1,000 people.
... dismissing these ideas as the war ended and men returned home. Their focus then turned to assuring the male public that women were still women and downplayed the independence they had gained. Nevertheless, those women paved the way for women after them to enter the work force, showing that even though their work was temporary during a time of crisis, they exceeded the expectations a nation had set for them.
...owards more love stories. Essentially more forms of propaganda ensued to let women know what they should be doing. More domestic jobs became available such as being a maid, restaurant work, dishwashing and cleaning. However women who worked war jobs wanted their own maids now so they could pursue their own dreams. They felt inspired and accomplished. Lola Wiexl mentioned that although skills within the workforce were easily learned, within the household traditions still persisted. Lola herself said she'd go home cook, clean and do the laundry while her brother laid on the couch. She didn't question it before but she was angry about it for years after her war time experience. Thus patriarchal hegemonies still existed after the war and were perpetuated by the government and media as much as possible to solicit women who participated in activities outside of the home.
However, when the war was over, and the men returned to their lives, society reverted back to as it had been not before the 1940s, but well before the 1900s. Women were expected to do nothing but please their husband. Women were not meant to have jobs or worry about anything that was occurrin...
Women were not only separated by class, but also by their gender. No woman was equal to a man and didn’t matter how rich or poor they were. They were not equal to men. Women couldn’t vote own business or property and were not allowed to have custody of their children unless they had permission from their husband first. Women’s roles changed instantly because of the war. They had to pick up all the jobs that the men had no choice but to leave behind. They were expected to work and take care of their homes and children as well. Working outside the home was a challenge for these women even though the women probably appreciated being able to provide for their families. “They faced shortages of basic goods, lack of childcare and medical care, little training, and resistance from men who felt they should stay home.” (p 434)
During the Great War and the huge amount of men that were deployed created the need to employ women in hospitals, factories, and offices. When the war ended the women would return home or do more traditional jobs such as teaching or shop work. “Also in the 1920s the number of women working raised by fifty percent.” They usually didn’t work if they were married because they were still sticking to the role of being stay at home moms while the husband worked and took care of the family financially. But among the single women there was a huge increase in employment. “Women were still not getting payed near as equally as men and were expected to quit their jobs if they married or pregnant.” Although women were still not getting payed as equally it was still a huge change for the women's
If one takes a closer look at the issues surrounding the differences between the male and female roles in the workforce and in education, one will notice that women tend to be one step below men on the "status" or "importance" ladder.