“Women’s Place” in the Labor Market

Abstract

In the last half of the twentieth century, large numbers of American women decided they wanted to take paying jobs. The American labor market was in one sense hospitable to these women—it absorbed millions of them at rising real wages. But employers’ hospitality was extended most readily to women who were willing to work in a “woman’s job.” Employers offered women an abundance of such jobs, but at a wage far lower than that paid in jobs open to men of comparable education and experience. The jobs employers most often offered to women carried duties with little scope for initiative, allowed little chance of learning valuable skills, and provided few opportunities for promotion.