Tuesday, May 5, 2009

Recession-Powered Gender Flop


So, this was another interesting article I just recently stumbled upon that is drawn from our economic recession: the changing gender roles that are forced about by the economic situation. Apparently, the majority of people who have lost their jobs have been men, with seventy-eight percent of the jobs lost being men's jobs. This forces the men to either take the traditionally female role of caring for the children and home or for them to seek employment in jobs that are traditionally seen as women's jobs far more than men's, such as nursing.
Do you think this idea that recessions fuel this kind of change or do you attribute it to something else? Also, do you think it's something that's going to continue once the economy is better again, or do you think things will revert back to the way it was?

Article:
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=7497859&page=1

Photo from http://holamun2.com/files/images/attachments/2008/03/work-sign.jpg

2 comments:

  1. I think the change is definitely brought on by the economic situation. Much like women in the past who stayed at home because there was no place in the workforce for them, the roles are now reversed. What I am really fascinated by though, is the attitude of some women regarding how they view men who are stay-at-home dads! A woman in the article stated that she has lost respect for her husband. Could it be that not only are gender roles changing, but our entire patriarchal system? Because of all the time that women have spent fighting for equality among the genders, I would have expected that they would give the respect that they themselves had so desperately sought.

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  2. Now lets all pray that this change doesnt occur to quickly now!!! We wouldnt want the partiarchal system to leap into a frenzy and the system of the world around us as we know it might get sucked into the orbit of the moon where nothing is right, most of us will be talking out of our asses, (which apparently a few of us already do, according to the last entry on "swearing")and our cars will be riding us to work!

    Now, recessions do fuel change. While we are used to the elite individuals on the hierarchy having access to all the resources they could require, they themselves are not used to the decrease of those resources as others are. And if they think they are suffering, what is it like for those that live in poverty both with and without a recession?

    In terms of Conflicted theorist, I to would have thought that women would not be responding to stay at home dads the way they are in consideration with gender equality. However, the basic wages that women make are less that then of men, so if a mom is out being the breadwinner, she is not bringing in nearly the amount of income that her husband would.. Theoretically speaking

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