In many ways, there has been a revolution in economic opportunity for women in the past thirty years. Today a girl growing up in North Carolina might become a doctor, a pilot, or a senator. Thirty years ago her options were much more limited. Most women worked in the home; many also worked on family farms. Those with paying jobs were in the minority, and they had a limited range of job opportunities.

Thirty years ago women and men were expected to play different roles in the economy. In junior high and high school, boys took woodworking, metalworking, and auto mechanics, along with academic subjects. Girls supplemented their academic classes with cooking, sewing, and typing. Newspapers had separate classified ads for “Help Wanted—Female” and “Help Wanted—Male.” Most women who worked for pay in North Carolina were textile workers, secretaries, teachers, or domestic workers. Men worked in a much broader range of occupations, and men’s jobs always paid more. A man who had dropped out of high school could expect to earn more than a woman with a college degree.

In the 1960s and 1970s, new federal laws were passed to help women gain economic equity. First came the Equal Pay Act, which guarantees equal pay to women and men who do the same work. Then came the Civil Rights Act, which forbids job discrimination based on sex, race, religion, or other differences. Other laws were passed to combat sex discrimination in schools, colleges, and universities.
 

Today female police officers have the same duties as male officers. But at the time this photo was taken, they mainly wrote parking tickets and directed traffic. Why do you think only the male officer on the right has a pistol?

Today we see women police officers and firefighters. Girls in school have more opportunities to play on sports teams. Women’s roles in the military have expanded greatly. More women now run their own businesses. Many more women go to college today, and more work in professional occupations. Thirty years ago there were very few female doctors, lawyers, or dentists. Today nearly one-third of the graduates of North Carolina’s medical and dental schools are women. Over 40 percent of law school graduates are women.

Six of every ten women today are in the work force. In fact, half of all the paid workers in our economy today are women. But some things have not changed all that much for women. Although most women today have jobs, they still do most of the housework and child rearing. And despite the wider opportunities open to women, most still work in traditional female occupations. For instance, 99 percent of all secretaries are women, as are 85 percent of all elementary school teachers.

Many of the jobs women do today in the workplace are modern versions of the work women used to do in the home. Before the Industrial Revolution, women spun and wove cloth at home. When cotton mills came to North Carolina a century ago, spinning and weaving became women’s work in the factory. Similarly, women have always cooked for their families and nursed sick relatives and friends. Today, many women work as cooks, waitresses, nurses, and nursing aides. Few men do these jobs.

The trouble with this occupational segregation is that women earn less than men. The median income for all North Carolina men who work is $17,474 per year. The median for all women who work is $10,716. Most African American, Native American, and Hispanic women earn less than white women. Some women earn less because they work part time. But even if we compare women and men who work full time, there is a large income gap; women earn only 70 percent as much as men.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

The real estate salesperson's jacket of the 1980s is evidence of women’s growing importance in the workforce.

Placing less value on women’s work than on men’s is not limited to North Carolina or to the United States. Anthropologist Margaret Mead studied many cultures around the world. She found villages where men fish and women weave and other villages where women fish and men weave. In all villages, the work done by men was valued more highly than work done by women.

Some people say low pay for women’s work is no problem, because a woman mostly depends on her husband for financial support. But many women support themselves. From ages twenty to twenty-four, over 60 percent of North Carolina women are single. Single includes women who are divorced, widowed, or never married. From ages twenty-five to thirty-four, about 33 percent of women are still single. Even when marriage reaches its peak, between ages thirty-five and fifty-four, 25 percent of women are still single.

If supporting oneself on women’s wages is difficult, supporting a family is nearly impossible. Every year more women are raising their children as single parents. In 1960 just 8 percent of North Carolina’s families with children were headed by a single woman. Today almost 20 percent of North Carolina’s families with children are headed by a single woman.

Many of these single mothers are not able to earn enough money to buy the basic things they and their children need. Many are young women who were teenagers when they dropped out of school and had their first children. The only jobs open to them are jobs as cashiers, cooks, nursing aides, or janitors, where one can work full time and still remain extremely poor.

What can a girl or young woman do to take advantage of the growing range of opportunities open to her today? First she must realize that she will probably work for most of her adult life and that for at least part of her adult life she is likely to be single. Then she can consider the full range of possible careers and not limit her sights to traditional female occupations. That means taking math and science classes in middle school and high school to keep the options open in careers in growing fields like computer science, electronics, and health care. Today’s young woman must graduate from high school and go on to college to take advantage of most of these opportunities.

What else? We all need to push our economy to place a higher value on “women’s work.” Jobs like nursing, child care, and teaching are essential for the health of our society. The people who do these jobs—whether women or men—need to be rewarded for their work.