Paid Employment in the Home Essay

Olsen, M.H. (1989, October). Work at Home for Computer Professionals: Current Attitudes and Future Prospects. ACM Transaction on Information Systems (TOIS) (Volume 7 Issue 4). Retrieved from http://tois.acm.org

In, “Halving the Double Day” by Dorothy Sue Cobble, she realizes that women get the bitter end of having a poor socio-economic status. Women are more burdened than men with balancing activities. Cobble states, “But none feel the pressure more than those juggling full-time employment with what can seem like a second shift at home” (Cobble, 1). Cobble believes that women, especially in lower income households face more stress and have less time to do things they want in life because they are burdened with finding and working in jobs as well as balancing house hold duties. Unlike men, who’s primary role in the household is to go out and work, women now who are in lower income families have to take on both roles assisting in income and doing house work. Furthermore, Cobble emphasizes that only those who are rich can benefit from the vast benefits that outsiders see in living in America. Cobble states, “Similarly the highly touted family-friendly workplace-the coveted market nook with flexible work schedules, job sharing, child care assistance, and comprehensive health and welfare coverage-is not yet a reality for the majority of salaried workers, let alone hourly workers”

Stephanie Coontz started off her article about the 50th anniversary of the publication of Betty Friedan’s international best seller, “The Feminine Mystique”, which was written about the women’s movement of the 1960s. What Coontz is trying to explain is that gender equality is not stalled, but “It has hit a wall”. Her title is the opposite of what she is trying to write about in the article. At first she talked about women’s rights back when the book was written. Instead of blaming the beliefs of gender roles from individuals, she points the finger at the economy and the work-family policies as the major problems to gender equality. She explains the gender equality stalled during 1990s and the first few years of the 2000s. She brought into text the usual statics, “the percentage of Americans preferring the male breadwinner/female homemaker family model actually rose to 40 percent from 34 percent. Between 1997 and 2007, the number of full-time working mothers who said they would prefer to work part time increased to 60 percent from 48 percent. In 1997, a quarter of stay-at-home mothers said full-time work would be ideal. By 2007, only 16 percent of stay-at-home mothers wanted to work full time.”(Coontz) She also talked about how 70 percent of men and women want an egalitarian relationship and how the demand of work has intensified.

In “The Second Shift: Working Parents and the Revolution at Home” author Arlie Hochschild examines the struggle faced by full-time working married couples to separate work and family. The families Hochschild focuses on are among different races and social classes, but are specifically two-parent heterosexual married couples, both maintain a full-time job, and have a child(ren) under the age of six (Hochschild 5). Hochschild interviewed and observed 50 couples on their daily lives for months. Within the book, readers are introduced to ten couples each couple seems to have a different problem than the others, but their struggle pertains to the same basis that is the ideas and feelings they have about gender and marriage (Hochschild 188). Hochschild separates these gender views into either traditional or egalitarian and separates strategies into women and men for how these couples can overcome their

The modern day woman works outside of the home, but then returns and continues to take care of housework and the children. Sociologists refer to this part of the woman’s day as the, “Second shift.” Two studies conducted found that if a man is more economically dependent on his wife, he is less likely to do housework. However, no evidence suggests that becoming economically independent makes marriage any less desirable for a woman. The family is the initial agent of socialization in their child’s life, however, even though the mother of the family may have the job with longer hours and better pay, the parents will still reinforce traditional gender roles in their household (Thompson 301-302.) This behavior can cause a child to embrace the stereotype that the woman’s only role is to cook, clean, and take care of the children. Even if a woman is the primary

“This remote work may be something we should be doing more of, according to two new studies. Working from home can be good for your health and productivity. Not only did people who worked from home report greater work satisfaction and less “work exhaustion,” they also got better sleep. Separately, researchers found that the highest performing workers were the most likely to cultivate and excel in a “WFH” environment (Gregoire, 2015)”. If workers don't prefer to work at home they are more than welcome to continue working at the main workplace. The company will give each employee the opportunity to try working from home in order to have more space at the main work

Sociology considers family as a major agent of socialization in society especially when it pertains to teaching gender roles. Within this institution, the recurring social practices and behaviors cause individuals to internalize learned rules. Gender is very frequently policed, and society designates different behaviors for masculine and feminine individuals. To be viewed as a competent member of society, one must correctly display their gender to fit into preestablished roles. A large part of these roles in a family setting ties to expectations of housework for men and women. Specifically, women and the phenomena known as the second shift where they find themselves essentially working two jobs, both in their workplace and then housework. (Class

In his essay he claims that , “Lately, the raging debate about issues of “work-life balance” has focused on whether or not women can “have it all.” completely lost in this situation is the growing strain of work-life balance on men, who today are experiencing the demands of work and home same or more than women” (697). By saying this , Dorment explains that men are forced to do more things than women these days and that we should equally pay attention to both man and women. Men are required to work outside of home and help with chores and take care of kids at home. He points out that men are working more than ever before in the history and tells facts on how much more dominant women are in earning degrees and wealth.

“The Second Shift” by Arlie Russell Hochschild sheds light on the fact that America is stuck in a perpetual loop, unable to change its societal gender expectations. Substantial progress has been made when it comes to women in the workplace, but that same progress is lacking when it comes to a woman’s work within the home. When looking at employed women the term “second shift” can be brought to the forefront. The expression “second shift” refers to the tasks done around the house after the initial work hours are through. Hochschild critiques how the American career system treats the “second shift”; she makes it clear that the working American society has yet to take the additional shift into consideration due to the already implemented

From the early 19th century to now, there have been dramatic changes that altered the outlook on the way women of different class, ethnic background and status completed their form of housework. To identify the differences and similarities of the conditions and the type of work the working class housewives and the middle class suburban housewives did, I will first define what housework is. In addition, I will then further list out the most common forms of domestic labour which women were expected to do as well as the type of changes which occurred from the 1930s to the 1960s and finally to the 1970s.

A homemaker being classified as a job worth compensation has been a recent topic of discussion for some time. After recent analysis it is plausible that it is worth quite a hefty cost. Homemaking can include an endless amount of duties and responsibilities. The magnitude of responsibilities is dependent on the size of the home and family. With all the tasks of the position, it requires more than the typical eight or twelve hour shift. Taking three of the many duties of a homemaker such as cooking, cleaning, and dependent care, I will make a comparison to assess a portion of what would be an estimated compensation.

The role of housewifery is not as commonplace as mothers who work, as both authors agree, but Hekker focuses on how she chose to be a stay-at-home mother and how society looked down upon her for being a housewife, while Edelman says that she did not have the choice of becoming a housewife. Back before it was acceptable for women to work in professional the workforce began really allowing women to join, women were just housewives. However, when the 1960's came around, more women were beginning to seek jobs. In the 70's, no more than sixteen percent of women were full-time housewives (Hekker 413). In present times though, it is so common for women to work, that it is considered unusual for a women to quit her job or reduce their work hours to stay home with a child.

Robert Dorment’s summary from his article talked about that women always complained about men did wrong but men who worked so hard for their family and work-life balance. Richard used that word “castigate” for men that means women scold men, but they did not realize men worked so hard. Other quote about the castigation of men, “…person whose husband, by her own admission, sacrificed much in his own academic career to do other heavy lifting with their children, all so she could pursue her dream job and then complain about it, bitterly, in the pages of a national magazine” (Dorment 708). Anne-Marie Slaughter explained that women who get promotion from other positions that they realized they do not have spent time with their family and some women who leave their jobs because of their family reasons. The quote said, “It is unthinkable that an official would actually step down to spend time with his or her family that this must be a cover for something else” (Slaughter 682). Third article called Women, work and work/life balance: Research roundup talked about the wage inequality and unequal responsibilities between men and women. Women have more family responsibilities than men do because some women are staying at home while taking care of their kids. Last article, Work-Life Balance – An integrated Approach: The case for joint and several responsibility talked about the

Conventionally, females played a very insignificant role in the paid work force of a society as many times they were expected to be home taking care of their family. Their roles at home can often include grocery shopping, meeting all the needs of her children and husband. As time moved on, our society became more accepted of sharing housework between the couples, but even so, the traditionally more feminine housework such as cooking, caring for sick children, and shopping for the entire family are mostly done by the females of the house. It is argued in a research journal Work and Occupations (Witkowski & Leicht, 1995) that in an average North American family, females take on roughly three-quarters of the housework. Even though we are in a democratic society, parenting roles in the household are assigned based on gender rather than in a democratic fashion (Winslow-Bowe, 2009). Because of the many responsibilities and obligations that are associated with the female gender, their career paths are eventually affected for the worse. According to Statistics Canada (2001), for every dollar a man earns, a single woman earns 93 cents and a married woman earns 69 cents. These statistics

The changes occurring in the workplace present several sub-trends. One of the most significant is that women are returning to it in large numbers. I use the term returning rather than entering because women comprised a major factor in the workforce during World War II, but was forced out by men returning from the war. Jamieson and O'Mara (1991) project that approximately 50% of the workforce will be comprised of women by the year 2000. Wives came to the rescue of the family in the 1970s and 1980s. Even though male earnings dropped substantially for all but the top 20% of male workers, real household incomes fell only marginally for the bottom 60%, and increased for the top 40%. One third of this increase was a result of a rise in female real annual earnings; however, two-thirds was due to women working more hours per year. Unfortunately, most income earners in the family are now working as many hours as they can. The reentrance of women into the workforce occurred during the transition from the industrial to the information age.