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Essay about Women's Work
Why gender inequality in education exists
Essay about Women's Work
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Since the late 1970s, the participation of women in the workforce has dramatically changed from women traditionally following their mother’s footsteps to obtaining an independent career of their own. According to Resident Scholar, Christina Hoff Sommers of the Huffington Post, "there are far more women than men in college, and they earn more than fifty-eight percent of [the] college degrees [in the year of 2013]." However, some women in the workforce do not receive the full compensation as men do, even though both genders have the same level of education. The book Lean In-Women, Work, and The Will to Lead by Sheryl Sandberg, suggests that there are several reasons why women are behind in the wage gap such as challenges, progressiveness, and character. On the contrary, I will also be researching women's work in my own field of study as a College Professor.
Sheryl Sandberg suggests that life is nothing but a challenge and that one must face obstacles before they taste the sweet fruit of success. Some individuals may consider the words challenge and obstacle as having similar concepts; however, when an individual looks in between the lines of women's work they can clearly see two
different categories, the physical and the psychological. For example, an undergraduate degree holder has to face physical challenges in order to complete their field of study such as attending class sessions and producing academic work; the psychological obstacle of the undergrad would be the unawareness of their own capabilities as they tends to discourage themselves to the point where they do not sit at the table nor take leadership actions in any work situation. According to Sheryl Sandberg, "women have to prove themselves to a far greater extent than...
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...oman among the 'Fortune'
500?"USATODAY.com - 2003: Year of the Woman among the 'Fortune' 500? N.p., 30
Dec. 2003. Web. 27 Feb. 2014.
Linkins, Jason. "Barack Obama's Columbia GPA Ferreted Out By The Daily Caller Via Random
Guy From The Interwebs." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 02 Nov. 2012.
Web. 14 Mar. 2014.
Pease, John. "Professor Mom: Woman's Work In A Man's World." Shatford Library.
Worldcat, (1993): 133. Academic Search Premier. Web. 14 Mar. 2014.
Sandberg, Sheryl. Lean in: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead. New York: Alfred A.Knopf,
2013. Print.
Sommers, Christina Hoff. "Wage Gap Myth Exposed By Feminists." The Huffington Post.
TheHuffingtonPost.com, 04 Nov. 2012. Web. 16 Mar. 2014.
Sommers, Christina Hoff. "Close the Wage Gap by Changing Your Major." The Huffington
Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 05 June 2013. Web. 12 Apr. 2014.
Dublin, Thomas. Women at Work. 1979, Columbia University Press, New York. p. 87
In her 2013 article featured on The Feminist Wire, “Dig Deeper: Beyond Lean In” bell hook describes “the feminist movement based on women gaining equal rights with men” (661). This essay is a response to Sheryl Sandberg’s book “Lean In: What Would You Do If You Weren’t Afraid?” which encourages women to aim for positions of leadership and power. Sandberg’s definition of a feminism is gender equality with an existing social system. Hook contrasts Sandberg’s definition of feminism and makes it her own “one that does not conjure up a battle between the sexes” (662). Since men and women are both greatly influenced by sexist social norms and ideals, it is important
The once male dominated, corporate, "white collar" America has seen a phenomenal influx of women within the last thirty years. Although a female lawyer, physician, or CEO is no longer considered a rarity in our times, women still face quite a deal of oppression in comparison to their male counterparts. In retrospect, some professions have always been controlled by women, and men have not made a noticeable advance in these fields. In 1970, finding a female lawyer to represent you would be a difficult task, since less than five percent of the profession were women. Today, that number has risen to almost thirty percent. The percentage of female doctors has almost tripled in the course of thirty years. African Americans have not made such a conspicuous progression within the last fifty years, while women have made a tremendous impact on the corporate world. One may wonder, how did women make these extraordinary advances? For the most part, it is due to the education they receive. At the present time young girls are encouraged to enroll in classes dealing with math and science, rather than home economics and typing. As pointed out by Nanette Asimov, in her essay "Fewer Teen Girls Enrolling in Technology Classes", school officials are advocating the necessity of advanced placement, and honor classes for teenage girls, in both the arts and sciences. This support and reassurance than carries over onto college, and finds a permanent fixture in a woman’s life. While women are continuing their success in once exclusively male oriented professions, they are still lacking the respect and equality from their peers, coworkers, and society. The average male lawyer, and doctor make twenty-five percent more money than their female equivalent. Women have always lived with the reputation of being intellectually inferior to, and physically submissive to men. This medieval, ignorant notion is far fetched from the truth. In 1999, high school men and women posted similar SAT scores, being separated by a only a few points. In addition to posting similar scores on the SAT, the average males score was a mere two-tenths of a point higher than an average females score on the ACT. Even though a woman maybe as qualified as a male for a certain occupation , women receive unwanted harassment, and are under strict scrutiny. A good illustration of this would be the women represented in "Two Women Cadets Leave the Citadel.
For several decades, most American women occupied a supportive, home oriented role within society, outside of the workplace. However, as the mid-twentieth century approached a gender role paradigm occurred. The sequence of the departure of men for war, the need to fill employment for a growing economy, a handful of critical legal cases, the Black Civil Rights movement seen and heard around the nation, all greatly influenced and demanded social change for human and women’s rights. This momentous period began a social movement known as feminism and introduced a coin phrase known in and outside of the workplace as the “wage-gap.”
We found literature that supported our survey results. The article, “Inequality quantified: Mind the gender gap,” shows that an established gender gap amongst college majors may have started years ago. In the 1970s, Lynne Kiorpes was one of the few females at Northeastern University who was an Engineering major. Her professor discriminated against her and the other few women in the class by saying that they have no business being in his class, and that he was going to fail them just because they are females. Kiorpes then left the engineering program...
In February 2015, Ellen Pao’s lawsuit against Kleiner Perkins, a venture capital firm, for gender discrimination went on trial. Pao alleged that she had been treated unfairly by her ex-bosses and passed on numerous times for promotion in favor of her male counterparts. While Pao did not win her lawsuit, the trial brought back to light the problem of gender discrimination and of the glass ceiling in corporate America. Since women started to enter the workforce, there always have been barriers and obstacles that prevented them from reaching the higher ranks on the corporate ladder. Public recognition that there was indeed a problem of discrimination helped giving women assurance
“In the United States and several other countries, women now actually surpass men in educational achievements” (Josh, “Harvard Summer School”). Some women are more educated and qualified for most
In “Lean In,” Sheryl Sandberg makes a case for being ambitious in any pursuit. Although she pushes for women to take on leadership positions, she acknowledges that that is not what all women want. The message to women is to do what they love and dream big, create a path through the obstacles, and achieve their full potential. Throughout the book, she acknowledges three differences women need to make within themselves. Firstly, women need to “sit at the table,” or increase their self-confidence when surrounded by men. Women also need to make their partner a real partner by getting their oftentimes male partners to do more at home: splitting home responsibilities between spouses helps to make homes and marriages happier. Lastly, women need to not hold themselves to unattainable standards by believing the myth of doing it all. No one can literally do it all: they just have to focus on what really matters. Sandberg has women ask themselves, “What w...
Lips, Hillary M. "The Gender Pay Gap: Challenging the Rationalizations. Perceived Equity, Discrimination, and the Limits of Human Capital Models." (n.d.): n. pag. Web.
The wage gap is a prevalent issue in the United States and must be closed in order to increase the quality of life for women across all fields of expertise. In 2014, female full-time workers made only 79 cents for every dollar earned by men, a gender wage gap of 21 percent (“Pay Equity & Discrimination”). As a woman who does the same amount of work for the same amount of time, just as well as as her male counterpart, the existence of a wage gap
Wallace, Kelly. "No Movement for Women at the Top in Corporate America." CNN. Cable News Network, 11 Dec. 2013. Web. 18 Apr. 2014.
In addition, women are paid less than men for the same type of work. According to Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg mentions that women were paid fifty-nine cents for every dollar men were paid in 1996, but women protested to raise the compensation to seventy-seven cents (6). This means that even though a woman and a man perform the same work such as an engineer does, both do the same assignments and have the same responsibilities in the technology place, men are paid twenty three cents more than women. Moreover, women suffer from “gender discount” which means women have to pay for being part of the workplace or society ...
When you think of a CEO of a company or of world political leaders, do you think of a man or of a woman? Many, if not most of us, see these positions as being held by men. In this essay, I will explain why women are still not equal to men. In the first paragraph I will discuss inequalities that happen in the workplace. The second section will show the differences that occur within the athletic world. Thirdly, I will explain the differences in education and home life. Even though we are approaching the twenty-first century, women in our society are still not equal to men.
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.
Women have had quite a few hurdles to get over since the 1950's. In 1958 the proportion of women attending college in comparison with men was 35 percent. (Friedan,