Class divisions among women

Politics and Society

Volumn 36, Issue 3, 2008, Pages 421-444

  Shalev, Michael ^a  

^a HEBREW UNIVERSITY OF JERUSALEM   (Israel)

Author keywords

Class; Family policy; Gender

Indexed keywords

EID: 49849086013     PISSN: 00323292     EISSN: 15527514     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/0032329208320570     Document Type: Conference Paper

References (67)

1. Irene Browne and Joya Misra, " The Intersection of Gender and Race in the Labor Market, " Annual Review of Sociology 29 (2003). 487-513 ; Evelyn Nakano Glenn, " Racial Ethnic Women's Labor: The Intersection of Race, Gender and Class Oppression, " Review of Radical Political Economics 17, no. 3 (1985). 86-108 ; and Leslie McCall, " The Complexity of Intersectionality, " Signs 30, no. 3 (2005). 1771-99.
2. Erik Olin Wright, " A Conceptual Menu for Studying the Interconnections of Class and Gender, " in Reconfigurations of Class and Gender, ed. Janeen Baxter and Mark Western, (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2001). 28-38.
3. Janet C. Gornick and Marcia Meyers, Families That Work: Policies for Reconciling Parenthood and Employment (New York: Russell Sage, 2003). and in " Creating Gender-Egalitarian Societies: An Agenda for Reform ", Politics and Society, 36 ( 2008 ).
4. Throughout this article, I use the terms higher class and lower class in a relative fashion, not as proper names for specific classes. My concern is with broad differences in economic advantage linked to either personal resources (i.e., education) or positions in production (i.e., occupations). In any event, data considerations make it necessary to take an eclectic approach to defining classes for empirical purposes.
5. For a recent contribution and references, see Ola Sjoberg, " The Role of Family Policy Institutions in Explaining Gender-Role Attitudes: A Comparative Multilevel Analysis of Thirteen Industrialized Countries, " Journal of European Social Policy 14, no. 2 (2004). 107-23.
6. Stefan Svallfors, The Moral Economy of Class: Class and Attitudes in Comparative Perspective ( Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2006 ).
7. Ibid Stefan Svallfors, The Moral Economy of Class: Class and Attitudes in Comparative Perspective, 112. Svallfors's index of support for women's paid employment includes questions that tap not only whether women's paid labor is seen as legitimate in terms of the division of labor with their husbands but also whether or not it is perceived as detrimental to their families and children.
8. Ibid., Table 6.2. With age and sex controlled, class gaps were lower by roughly half in Britain and the United States, compared to Germany and Sweden.
9. For a valuable analysis of General Social Survey data and references to further literature, see M. V. Lee Badgett, Pamela Davidson, and Nancy Folbre, " Breadwinner Dad, Homemaker Mom: An Interdisciplinary Analysis of Changing Gender Norms in the United States, 1977-1998 " (unpublished paper, Department of Economics, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, 2002 ).
10. R.J. Harris and J.M. Firestone, " Changes in Predictors of Gender Role Ideologies among Women: A Multivariate Analysis, " Sex Roles 38, no. 3 (1998). 239-52. Other studies have confirmed the importance of education but without testing the effect of occupational class. K.M. Blee and A.R. Tickamyer, " Racial Differences in Men's Attitudes about Women's Gender Roles, " Journal of Marriage and the Family 57, no. 1 (1995). 21-30 ; and C.I. Bolzendahl and D.J. Myers, " Feminist Attitudes and Support for Gender Equality: Opinion Change in Women and Men, 1974-1998, " Social Forces 83, no. 2 (2004). 759-89.
11. Robert Erikson, John H. Goldthorpe, and Lucienne Portocarero, " Intergenerational Class Mobility in Three Western European Societies: England, France and Sweden, " British Journal of Sociology 33 (1979). 1-34.
12. Managerial and professional: 22 percent; semiprofessional: 28 percent; routine nonmanual: 27 percent; working class: 24 percent.
13. Catherine Hakim, Work-Lifestyle Choices in the 21st Century: Preference Theory (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000). 73.
14. See, for example, Rosemary Crompton and Fiona Harris, " A Reply to Hakim, " The British Journal of Sociology 49, no. 1 (1998). 144-49 ; and S. McRae, " Constraints and Choices in Mothers' Employment Careers: A Consideration of Hakim's Preference Theory, " British Journal of Sociology 54, no. 3 (2003). 317-38.
15. Page references refer to Gornick and Meyers, Families That Work.
16. Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson, Off Center: The Republican Revolution and the Erosion of American Democracy ( New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2005 ).
17. Julia Overturf Johnson and Barbara Downs, Maternity Leave and Employment Patterns of First-Time Mothers: 1961-2000 (U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Reports, 2005). Table 5.
18. Jennifer Ehrle, Gina Adams, and Kathryn Tout, Who's Caring for Our Youngest Children? Child Care Patterns of Infants and Toddlers (Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2001). Figures 5 and 8. The results refer to the primary-care arrangement only, and the analysis of income was limited to two-parent families. Parallel findings for the care of older children (elementary-school age) reveal only small effects of income on the broad types of care utilized. See Jeffrey Capizzano, Kathryn Tout, and Gina Adams, Child Care Patterns of School-Age Children with Employed Mothers (Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2000). Table 2.
19. Linda Giannarelli, Sarah Adelman, and Stefanie Schmidt, Getting Help with Child Care Expenses (Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2003). Figure 3.
20. Marcia Meyers, Dan Rosenbaum, Christopher Ruhm, and Jane Waldfogel. "Inequality in Early Childhood Education and Care: What Do We Know?" (unpublished paper, Social Inequality Program, New York, Russell Sage Foundation, 2004 ).
21. http://www.familiesandwork.org/site/work/workforce/2002nscw.html (accessed June 5, 2008 ).
22. A. Durfee and M.K. Meyers, " Who Gets What from Government? Distributional Consequences of Child-Care Assistance Policies, " Journal of Marriage and the Family 68, no. 3 (2006). 733-48.
23. Note, however, that Durfee and Meyers qualify their findings by pointing out that New York provides unusually extensive childcare supports.
24. Anne B, Shlay, Marsha Weinraub, Michelle Harmon, and Henry Tran, " Barriers to Subsidies: Why Low-Income Families Do Not Use Child Care Subsidies, " Social Science Research 33, no. 1 (2004). 134-57.
25. Gornick and Meyers, Families That Work, Table 7.5. On the basis of the Urban Institute surveys cited earlier, Gornick and Meyers show that for middle- and high-income families, the burden of childcare costs in the United States is fairly similar to France, except that a higher proportion of families have out-of-pocket expenses. However, they do not consider the effects of France's extensive public provision on the tax burden.
26. For a recent evaluation of the Swedish experiment, see Anita Nyberg, Parental Leave, Public Childcare and the Dual Earner/Dual Carer Model in Sweden (discussion paper presented at the Swedish Peer Review of the European Employment Strategy, Stockholm, April 2004). Indications of the political barriers to extending the current system within Sweden or exporting it to other Scandinavian countries are provided by Tommy Ferrarini, " Sweden: Towards a New Model of Family Policy? " (unpublished paper, Swedish Institute of Social Research, Stockholm, 2007). and Heikki Hiilamo and Olli Kangas, " Trap for Women or Freedom to Choose? Political Frames in the Making of Child Home Care Allowances in Finland and Sweden " ( paper presented at the annual conference of the Research Committee on Poverty, Social Welfare and Social Policy [RC19], Northwestern University, Chicago, September 2005 ).
27. Examples are Hakim, Work-Lifestyle Choices ; Hadas Mandel and Moshe Semyonov, " Family Policies, Wage Structures, and Gender Gaps: Sources of Earnings Inequality in 20 Countries, " American Sociological Review 70, no. 6 (2005). 949-67 ; and Hadas Mandel and Moshe Semyonov, " A Welfare State Paradox: State Intervention and Women's Employment Opportunities in 22 Countries, " American Journal of Sociology 111, no. 6 (2006). 1910-49.
28. Margarita Estevez-Abe, " Gender Bias in Skills and Social Policies: The Varieties of Capitalism Perspective on Sex Segregation, " Social Politics 12, no. 2 (2005). 180-215. Quoted from page 192; emphasis added.
29. Marianne Nordli Hansen, " The Vicious Circle of the Welfare State? Women's Labor Market Situation in Norway and Great Britain, " Comparative Social Research 15 (1995). 1-34.
30. Precisely for this reason, the center-right coalition that has held office in Sweden since 2006 favors tax rebates for families that hire private household help.
31. Gosta Esping-Andersen, Social Foundations of Postindustrial Economies ( Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1999 ).
32. Jane Lewis and Gertrude Astrom, " Equality, Difference, and State Welfare: Labor Market and Family Policies in Sweden, " Feminist Studies 18, no. 1 (1992). 59-87 ; Nyberg, Parental Leave.
33. http://www.jusek.se/, cited by Nyberg, Parental Leave, 19.
34. Gosta Esping-Andersen, The Three Worlds of Welfare Capitalism (Cambridge, UK: Polity, 1990). and Jon Eivend Kolberg, ed., The Welfare State as Employer ( Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1991 ).
35. Martin Rein, " The Social Welfare Labor Market, " in The Welfare State and Its Aftermath, ed. S. N. Eisenstadt and Ora Ahimeir (London: Croom Helm, 1985). 109-31 ; and Jon Eivend Kolberg and Gosta Esping-Andersen, " Welfare States and Employment Regimes, " in Between Work and Social Citizenship, ed. Jon Eivend Kolberg (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1993). 3-35.
36. P. Robson, S. Dex, F. Wilkinson, and O.S. Cortes. " Low Pay, Labour Market Institutions, Gender and Part-Time Work: Cross-National Comparisons." European Journal of Industrial Relations 5, no. 2 (1999). 187-207.
37. Janet C. Gornick and Jerry A. Jacobs, " Gender, the Welfare State, and Public Employment: A Comparative Study of Seven Industrialized Countries, " American Sociological Review 63, no. 5 (1998). 688-710, Table 3.
38. Marianne-Nordli Hansen, " The Scandinavian Welfare State Model: The Impact of the Public Sector on Segregation and Gender Equality, " Work, Employment and Society 11, no. 1 (1997). 83-99 ; and Patricia Rice, Gender Earnings Differentials: The European Experience (working paper no. 8, World Bank Policy Research Report on Gender and Development, 1999). 25.
39. Inga Persson and Christina Jonung, eds., Women's Work and Wages ( London: Routledge, 1998 ).
40. J. Albrecht, A. Bjorklund, and S. Vroman, " Is There a Glass Ceiling in Sweden? " Journal of Labor Economics 21, no. 1 (2003). 145-77.
41. Margarita Estevez-Abe, Torben Iversen, and David Soskice, " Social Protection and the Formation of Skills: A Reinterpretation of the Welfare State, " in Varieties of Capitalism: The Institutional Foundations of Comparative Advantage, ed. Peter A. Hall and David W. Soskice (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2001). 145-83.
42. Hadas Mandel and Michael Shalev, " Gender, Class and the Varieties of Capitalism Perspective, " Social Politics (forthcoming).
43. The literature on varieties of capitalism theory focuses on the overall direction favored by systems of skill formation (general vs. specific skills), but typical human capital requirements also vary between different levels of the job structure irrespective of the skills regime. In all varieties of capitalism, requirements for on-the-job training (OJT) are especially stringent in the higher (professional and managerial) class, which comprises occupations characterized by a high degree of task specificity. See J.G. Polavieja, " Task Specificity and the Gender Wage Gap: Theoretical Considerations and Empirical Analysis of the Spanish Survey on Wage Structure, " European Sociological Review 21, no. 2 (2005). 165-81. Even in the United States, a liberal economy in which employers are said to rely predominantly on general skills, it has been shown that women's limited participation in OJT explains much of their exclusion from highly paid jobs. See D. Tomaskovic Devey and S. Skaggs, " Sex Segregation, Labor Process Organization, and Gender Earnings Inequality, " American Journal of Sociology 108, no. 1 (2002). 102-28.
44. Gosta Esping-Andersen, Changing Classes: Stratification and Mobility in PostIndustrial Societies ( London: Sage, 1993 ).
45. Had this analysis included workers under twenty-five, the U.S. menial services class would have grown due to the many young people employed in the "food-and-fun" sector.
46. The present estimate of the difference between the two countries may be conservative. Using somewhat different procedures, including controlling at the individual level for cross-national differences in workforce composition, Mandel and Semyonov find that women's probability of having a managerial occupation compared with men's is more than 80 percent greater in the United States than in Sweden. Mandel and Semyonov, "Welfare State Paradox," Figure 6.
47. Nevertheless, at 71 percent, the proportion of menial service workers who are women is lower in the United States than the eleven other countries analyzed by Mandel and myself. One reason for this is the role of minority men. Nonwhite men are three times more likely than white men to work as menial service workers in the United States. Hadas Mandel and Michael Shalev, " A Class Perspective on Gender Inequality: How Welfare States Shape the Gender Pay Gap " (working paper no. 433, Luxembourg Income Study 2006 ).
48. A calculation not reported in Table 1 indicates that at the median, the ratio between the wages of managers and menials is 2.2 to 1 in the United States and 1.6 to 1 in Sweden.
49. A similar analytical strategy, inspired by the work of Blau and Kahn, has been adopted by Gornick, Mandel and Semyonov, and Mandel and Shalev. Needless to say, however, gender is to some extent endogenous to both class structure and class inequality. Francine D. Blau and Lawrence M. Kahn, " The Gender Earnings Gap: Learning from International Comparisons, " American Economic Review 82, no. 2 (1992). 533-38 ; Janet C. Gornick, " Gender Equality in the Labor Market, " in Gender and Welfare State Regimes, ed. Diane Sainsbury (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1999). 210-42 ; Mandel and Semyonov, " Family Policies, Wage Structures, and Gender Gaps "; and Mandel and Shalev, " Class Perspective on Gender Inequality "
50. This is not the place to enter into the ethical aspects of the problem. Suffice it to say that it would not be difficult for advocates of progressive family policy to argue that, for example, the importance of economic autonomy for the well-being of lower-class women justifies such policies, even if the beneficiaries do not demand them.
51. Andrew Sayer, " Moral Economy " (unpublished paper, Department of Sociology, Lancaster University, 2004). 3.
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58. Ibid.; and Kathrin Zippel, " The Missing Link for Promoting Gender Equality: Family-Work & Anti-Discrimination Policies " in Earning and Caring: Creating the Conditions for Gender-Egalitarian Families, ed. Janet Gornick ( London: Verso, forthcoming).
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62. Mary Fainsod Katzenstein and Carol McClurg Mueller, The Women's Movements of the United States and Western Europe: Consciousness, Political Opportunity, and Public Policy, Women in the Political Economy (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1987). Walter Korpi, " Faces of Inequality: Gender, Class, and Patterns of Inequalities in Different Types of Welfare States, " Social Politics 7, no. 2 (2000). 127-91 ; and Amy G. Mazur, " Drawing Comparative Lessons from France and Germany, " Review of Policy Research 20, no. 3 (2003). 493-523.
63. Mary Ruggie, " Workers' Movements and Women's Interests: The Impact of Labor-State Relations in Britain and Sweden, " in The Women's Movements of the United States and Western Europe: Consciousness, Political Opportunity, and Public Policy, ed. Mary Fainsod Katzenstein and Carol McClurg Mueller (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1987). 248.
64. Gillian Whitehouse, " Legislation and Labour Market Gender Inequality: An Analysis of OECD Countries, " Work, Employment and Society 6, no. 1 (1992). 65-86.
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