Gender Stratification : Career Women

Today, nations notice gradual changes in the labour force as more and more women enter the workplace. This is due to factors such as the decline of labor-intensive job, the growth of cities, women marrying at a later age, more effective means of contraception, a rising divorce rate, and households that need to rely on more than one income.

Gender guides how we think about ourselves, how we interact with others, and what opportunities and constraints we face throughout our lives (Macionis, 1999). Regardless of the increasing proportions of women in the workplace, their social and economic standing remains disadvantaged, especially for working mothers with the need to balance career and family life. Gender stratification refers to the unequal distribution of wealth, power and privilege between the males and the females (Macionis, 1999). Feminists demands have diminished the way gender has been stratified. Working womens privileges became more pronounced in richer countries because of these movements. Unfortunately, many countries are still not used to this vision of feminism the advocacy of social equality for the sexes (Macionis, 1999). The article I have chosen discusses how Germany, despite being a rich country, is still struggling to secure equal job opportunities for women, especially mothers.

Germany has day-care places for only a sixth of its children under three. Although it was anticipated that as men become fathers, they would share, or to the least, increase
Madison Sheena Nazareno Vejerano (08B1904) SP1107 Reflective Portfolio Assignment Universiti Brunei Darussalam

their household responsibilities, this was not the case (OConnell, 2003). Mothers are therefore tied back to the gender role of parenting as it is culturally more of a womans responsibility a gender identity. Pregnancy and raising small children keep many women out of the labor force. Because of this pressure, German women are often more reluctant than most in Europe to have children. On the other hand, when career women become mothers, the burden of household labor and other demands of parenting, disables them to maintain fast-paced jobs. German mothers may resolve this problem by taking prolonged leave from work. Businesses often punish women who try to balance motherhood by placing them into mommy tracks that allows limited upward mobility (Neubeck & Neubeck, 2002), which eventually damages their careers.

In Germany, womens average hourly wages are 22% lower than mens. Because until 1957, Germany was driven by capitalism and patriarchy, most employees may still have the mentality that women are justified to earn lower incomes as they perform work that have less value compared to works of the advantaged class the men. (Historically, womens positions appear to be always of subordination to men.)

Because of this societal issues for women, especially working mothers, Germany had promoted changes to support working women, especially mothers. From the article, some of the strategies include introducing parents pay, approving a law to provide enough day-care slots for children aged three or less, and promoting parental-leave benefits. Germany should also adopt a policy of comparable worth, which means that people should be paid on the basis of education and experience needed to do a job and the

Madison Sheena Nazareno Vejerano (08B1904) SP1107 Reflective Portfolio Assignment Universiti Brunei Darussalam

stress, responsibilities and working conditions associated with them (Brym and Lie, 2007). This would be helpful in eliminating gender stratification in the workplace, especially now that girls in Germany earn more than half of the university degrees and research shows that girls obtain better marks than the boys in school.

Though the article working mothers, unite! focuses primarily in the country of Germany, the issue is of relative importance to other parts of the world, too. Because social change is always slow, and gender discrimination has effects almost as negative as racial discrimination, trying to eliminate gender stratification earlier would provide nations a lot of benefit. Since cultural expectations of gender divides the full range of human qualities into masculinity and feminity (Macionis, 1999), gender equality especially in the workplace, would allow every individuals to enrich themselves and reach their full-potential, which in turn, may contributes to a non-discriminatory and a more productive society.

Madison Sheena Nazareno Vejerano (08B1904) SP1107 Reflective Portfolio Assignment Universiti Brunei Darussalam