Chapter 14, Work and Family

1. Chapter 14, Work and Family • The Labor Force - A Social Invention • The Traditional Model: Provider Husbands Homemaking Wives • Women in the Labor Force • Two-Earner Marriages • Unpaid Family Work

2. Chapter 14, Work and Family • Juggling Employment and Unpaid Family Work • Diversity and Child Care • Selecting a Child-Care Facility • The Two-Earner Marriage and the Relationship

3. Husbands and the Provider Role • The “good provider role” emerged in the the 1830’s and lasted through the late 1970’s. • In 2000, 19% of men in married-couple families were the sole breadwinner compared with 42% in 1960.

4. Provider Role Systems • Main/secondary provider couple - providing is the man’s responsibility, the home is the woman’s. • Co provider couple - both partners are equally responsible for providing.

5. Provider Role Systems • Ambivalent provider couple-wife’s providing responsibilities are not clearly acknowledged. • Role-reversed provider couple - husband is responsible for homemaking and child care while the wife is the principle breadwinner.

6. The Wage Gap • Women who worked full time in 2000 earned 76 cents for every dollar earned by men. • Among managers and specialists, women earned 71% of average male wages. • Childless women earn 90% of what males with comparable experience and education earn while mothers at the same level earn only 79%.

7. Reasons for the Wage Gap • Concentration of women in lower-paying occupations and lower-status positions. • Employers continue to stereotype women as lacking in career commitment.

8. Reasons for the Wage Gap • Women may aspire to traditional female occupations because they believe these are the only ones open to them. • Married men may have wives who contribute to their careers directly or indirectly (by doing most of the domestic work.). • Motherhood has a tremendous lifetime impact on earnings.

9. Housework • Marriage increases household labor hours for women. • Including child care, many employed wives put in a second shift of family work that amounts to an extra month of work each year.

10. Theories: Why Women Do Housework • Conflict and feminist - women have less power in their families. • Ideological - cultural expectations of household labor. • Rational investment - couples maximize the family economy by trading off between time and energy investments in paid market work and unpaid household labor.

11. Theories: Why Women Do Housework • Resource hypothesis - a spouse’s household labor is a consequence of his/her resources compared to those of the other spouse. • Gender construction - studies the meaning of housework, rather than the practicalities of time and income.

12. Reinforcing Cycle • Men with full-time employment earn more than women who work full-time. • In a couple, the wife’s (lower) paid work role is more vulnerable than the husband’s. • As a result, the wife will spend less time and energy in the labor force, giving employers a reason to pay women less than men.

13. Reinforcing Cycle • This encourages husbands to see their wives work as less important and conclude that they shouldn’t take responsibly for homemaking. • Burdened with household labor, wives find it difficult to invest themselves in the labor market to the same degree as their husbands.

14. Approaches to Child Care • Mothering - couple prefers that the wife care for the children. • Parenting - family care is shared by parents • Market - career oriented couples hire other people to care for their children.

15. Resolving Work-Family Issues • Families need: • Adequate provision for quality child and elder care • Family leave • Flexible employment scheduling