Despite Legislation for Equal Opportunities,
sexism is still in evidence in
the workplace.
Sexism is a particular concern for society
when considering it's effect in the
workplace. Sexism has always been a
particular problem in the labour
market especially with the formation of
capitalism. In the last half of the
20th century this has been especially
highlighted due to the increase of
woman entering the labour market. This aroused
the need for a legislation
for equal opportunity for both sex's to be
passed in 1975. It stated that
discrimination of a persons sex whether male
or female was unlawful in
employment, union membership, education,
provision of goods, services,
advertisements and pay.
In this essay the discussion will cover
subjects such as why woman hold a
large percentage of the work force in
companies but hardly any seem to
have any power. Obstacles in the way of woman
in careers, if women
prefer different jobs to men, equal pay for
both sexes and what's changed
since the law was made an Act of Parliament.
This essay will only
concentrate on the problem of sex
discrimination in the U.K.
Sex discrimination means that a person gets
treated in a less favorable
manner because of their sex. A good example
of this is to take two fictional
characters, Mr. and Mrs. Jones. The Jones's
want to go swimming, they get
to the swimming baths where they find that
Mrs. Jones is charged an O.A.P.
price while Mr. Jones has to pay the full
price even though they are both the
same age. This is because woman become
pensioners at the age of sixty
while men cannot gain the benefits until they
are sixty five.
Sex discrimination is not only present within
the older generation but is also
evident throughout the entire age range.
Before legislation was passed in the
1960's most young girls left school after
O-levels to receive a strong social
message that their careers where already
setup for them as marriage and
motherhood (Pascall 1995: 2). The only jobs
they would be getting were
tedious low paid jobs (a Secretary) and be
only looking forward to when
they would meet a man, have a family and
settle down. Statistics show that
in 1971, 51% of married women did not work
compared to 29% in 1993
(Pascall 1995: 3). Women now hold 46% of the
labor work force, with
young women seeing housework more of a
part-time rather than a full time
job. This is an enormous social change for
the family giving women less
dependence on marriages which are
increasingly falling apart day by day
and a greater command over the increasing
area of technology and resources.
With more women getting jobs, it encourages
other woman who were reluctant
to move into the labour market to do the same
and become more career
minded.
Although woman now make up 46% of the English
work force only 3% of
woman hold chief executive positions. This
has only increased by 2% in the
last 20 years (Mildrew 1992: 17). A point to
be raised here is that as the
hierarchy of management positions increases,
the amount of women in these
positions decreases. This quite clearly means
that woman do not hold the
prestige and influence that men do, as their
sector of high ranking jobs is so
small. We've all heard men say at some point,
"I just don't understand
women", yet there are only 5 woman High
Court Judges out of 91 men and 28
women circuit judges out of 496 men in the Judiciary
in 1993 (Pascall 1995:
2).
Thanks to media attention women do have
access to careers. In 1980 woman
made up 12-14% of professional and managerial
jobs. In 1990 the figure had
raised to 32% managers/administrators and 40%
professionals. On the other
hand women seem to fall into different
sectors to men, they make up 62% of
teachers and librianship but only 25% of
business and financial professionals
and shockingly only 5% of engineers and
technologists. Teaching is a qualified
position, 90% of primary school teachers and
60% of secondary teachers are
women but 50% primary and 80% secondary
school heads are men. This is the
same right the way across the specturm, in
university only 5% of professors are
women (Pascall 1995: 3).
This segregation of gender in different jobs
can be separated into two
dimensions, vertical and horizontal. Vertical
segregation is the segregation of
gender in the hierarchy of power in a certain
job. Woman tend to be found at
the low end of vertical segregation in
professional occupations. Horizontal
segregation is the segregation of gender in
the spread of different occupations.
Woman are usually found dominating teaching
while men dominate
engineering. Data from the Eurostat Labour
survey shows when woman break
horizontal segregation by increasing their
presence in a particular occupation,
vertical segregation becomes securely
established. This is shown by the fact
that 3 per cent of all clerks and typists in
1911 were woman. By 1971 the
situation had reversed and woman dominated
this area. As soon as the number
of woman increased, office work was down
graded and became a low paid
dead end job by deskilling. The activities where broken down to suit what was
thought as women's abilities (Mildrew 1992:
12).
Educational qualifications are a must for
anyone who wants a career (man or
woman). 20 years ago girls would have left
education at the end of their O-levels being norm. In the 1991/92 GCSE results
42.7% of girls compared with
34.1% of boys received 5 or more A-C grades
and 16.1% compared with
14.4% of boys received 3 or more passes at
A-Level. The number of woman
students at university has tripled in the
last 21 years which is almost twice the
increase
for male, making up 48% of the student population. At degree level
46-48% of medicine/business and financial
students are women but only 12%
take engineering or technology. These men /
woman dominated areas are
clearly seen, simply by looking in classrooms
at secondary or university
education. 91% of sociology classes are
female dominated and about 90% of
computer science / physics, classes are male
dominated (Pascall 1995: 4).
The Sex Discrimination Act is in power to
help woman in a number of ways
and lets them into previously closed doors.
However due to the fact that most
legal institutions are male dominated it is
not quite as clear cut as it may seem
on the outside. The law is often interpreted
restrictivly meaning a woman may
have to fight an unequal battle with her
employer and even if they come out
victorious little compensation is received
and she may be victimized at work
in the aftermath.
A major need for the discrimination act is to
try to help break down the
presence of what is known as the glass ceiling'. This is where men get
promoted and go further up the managerial
hierarchy while woman get to a
certain position and can not climb any
further. Although they can see the men
climbing further up the company they cannot
break the glass ceiling
themselves (Gregg 1991: 8).
A study called Indsco' in a large industrial conglomerate
lead by Rosabeth
Moss Kanter (A management professor at
Harvard) in 1977, recognized that
people who work in large organizations have a
tendency to hire and promote
those who resemble themselves (Mildrew 1992:
17).
Unfortunately some men feel uncomfortable
with women being their equals
and since men dominate managerial levels they
have much more control over
peoples careers beneath them. If men do not
recognize women as their equals,
then women are overlooked for transfer or
promotion, find themselves
directed into
female' job areas and are not offered a challenge. Men use
strategies to cope with women such as
patronizing them, not listening to them
seriously, being over protective and
shielding them from dangerous situations
so they never have the knowledge of how to
cope (Allen 1993 p26).
The Employment Act 1978 gives women going
through pregnancy and child
birth the right to have time off with no loss
of position. This is only given
however to woman who have a career involving
full time and continuous
employment and stops just 29 weeks after
childbirth (Pascall 1995: 4). Parental
leave, flexible hours and care of the child
in sickness and health is left for the
employer and employee to discuss.
This is a very complex problem because once a
child is born it must have the
proper care and attention. Nursery provisions
for women who want to go back
to work are appalling. Only 2% of work places
have nursery facilities and the
male dominated government seem to think that
the problem doesn't exist!
Shocking statistics show that for every 14
females that work full time there is
only one which has children between the ages
of 0 and 15 years old. i.e. There
is 4,200,000 woman with no children in full
time work and only 300,000
woman with children between the age of 0 to
15 (Pascall 1995: 4). Taking into
account that most woman would like to have at
least one baby, there is going
to be a lot of woman in low paid jobs.
Professions such as medicine which
require an intensive course of work to build up
the knowledge for the career
has actually implied a ban on woman with
children. Even traditional woman's
jobs such as nursing do not have a career
that can comfortably take on board
a woman with her off-spring.
Since for most women all this is a bit to
much they will most certainly turn to
part-time employment which will be punished
by lower grading and pay.
In 1975 the equal pay act came into power.
This made it illegal to offer
different wages for the same work on the
grounds of sex. Men's full time
wages over woman's fell drastically. The gap
has been narrowing ever since.
The New Earnings Survey (NES) shows that in
1980, men's pay stood 40%
more on average over women's and in 1992 that
gap had narrowed to 25%.
Woman in low paid jobs, where before were
paid much less then men now
have leveled up to the same wage or sometimes
higher. However in high flying
jobs there still is a large wage difference.
The NES showed that woman's
hourly earnings where on an average 70.9% of
men's in 1990. The problem
being is that since woman go into different
areas of work than men it may be
very difficult to compare the skills and
amount of work they do to claim equal
pay.
We can see that even with the law, there are
many loop holes that clever
employees can seek. This isn't the only thing
that stands in the way of woman
who want a career, there are many other
obstacles. Society is a very powerful
instrument, people get molded by the society
they are in. It changes the way
people think and act. Also (From personal
experiance) many children are
directed to appropriate traditional' subjects by their secondary
socialization
in schools particularly by old fashioned' teachers.
Unfortunately the law is not beneficial to
everyone. It is not allowed to be
broken, but there are numerous ways of
stretching it! A good example of this
is D.Quinnen vs Mr. J.H. Hovell. Mr. Hovell
hired 2 woman and 1 man to
work in his store at Christmas time. The 2
woman got paid more than the man.
Mr. Quinnen complained and was dismissed, he
claimed equal pay and sex
discrimination.
Mr. Quinnen took this case to the industrial
tribunal (I.T.). At a preliminary
hearing the tribunal dismissed Mr. Quinnens
claims on the grounds that he was
not employed by Mr. Hovell as the definition
of employment was that there
was a
contract of service' which Mr. Quinnens did not have. Mr. Quinnens
actually then to took his case to the
Employment Appeal Tribunal which
awarded him œ530 (E.O.C 1989: 63), but most
people would not take the case
this far after getting turned away by the
I.T. A useful rule for woman is that the
law works on the rule of precedent, where if
a woman has won a case before
almost in the same position as the woman who
may want to go to court now,
the previous case will be used as a base for
the prevailing case. With this in
mind woman can almost see what the outcome of
the case will be before even
going to court, saving themselves
victimization from male counterparts.
From what we have seen it appears that male
dominance is to be blamed for
women's under achievement in the work place.
However this may be a one
sided view. Once a woman gets a job in power
she may adopt the I had to
work hard to get where I am so why shouldn't
others' attitude and will
discourage other woman from taking
responsibility. Woman also tend to be
more cautious then men, a survey by British
Gas showed that when a
opportunity came up in their company for a
job with more power the women
would only apply for it if they fitted the
whole job criteria unlike men who
applied for it even if they didn't fill half
the description (Allen 1993: 30). The
other obstacle that woman would seem to set
up for themselves is their own
confidence. A study taped seven university
faculty meetings and found that
men's contributions before someone broke in
ranged from 11 to 17 seconds
while woman's where 3 to 10 seconds. Women
also use deferential tag lines
like "Don't you think?" and
"Isn't it?" far more often then men and are
reluctant to delegate work so they overload
themselves (Mildrew 1992: 18).
In reflection to the examples given evidence
shows that the effectiveness of
introducing the numerous acts of parliament
have not been entirely successful
on implementation. Trends show that through
out education females have been
directed towards traditional feminine
subjects. Lack of fundamental education
needed to back up university courses have
reflected women's immobility to
achieve positions of high statues in the
whole range of occupations. Mature
woman share this problem as lack of
qualifications in appropriate subjects
prevents them from achieving powerful
positions.
Clearly, it can be seen that women are
getting the same wage as men in low
paying jobs since the Sexual Discrimination
act was passed in 1975 but there
is still a long way to go until woman in
managerial jobs get an equal wage to
there counterparts. The fact that women are
entering different job areas to men
e.g. Teaching / Social working, means that
even if a woman takes a company
to court because she believes she is not
getting paid as much as a male
employee, even though she is using the same
skills and has the same work
load, this is very hard to prove if the two
employees are not doing the same
job.
With most woman wanting babies, and leaving
full time work to have a child
and probably only taking up part-time work
after it is born, it gives directors
of companies a very bad opinion of women in
powerful jobs as they believe
that as soon as the woman has worked her way
up she will leave the company
due to maternity leave and never be able to
keep up the same quality of work
as before. Women tend to naturally set
obstacles in their own way and it seems
that the only way to get a powerful,
influential, prestigious job is to never have
a baby and are never get married.
The law is not much use for woman in power as
there is so many males above
them in any company. The usefulness of the
law can be seen however in the
fact of
precedent' where any previous case of a woman taking a company to
court for sexual discrimination or equal pay
and winning may be considered
in a similar court case.
The glass ceiling is a major obstacle
preventing woman from achieving high
status professions. However since the law has
been in power I believe that the
glass ceiling is cracking but it's going to
take a lot more years to see any kind
of noticeable improvements in woman's
careers.
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