Women in the Workforce

Since women began breaking into the work force the men’s world has been on the offensive and repeatable discriminating against women because of their views of women’s roles in society.   They are seen as the weaker sex and considered inferior to men.  
Atkins and Hoggett discussed the three ways the legal system has attempted to justify limiting women’s job opportunities.   The first belief is women’s natural inferiority suggesting women are too emotionally, intellectually, and physically weaker lacking the ability to perform certain jobs outside of the home.   Maternity is their second justification used to restrict women’s work. They justified this as being a danger to young infants whose mothers were working outside the home.   This portrayed a bleak picture for women as being trapped into staying home because society depends on them to do so. Prior to 1970 pregnant women were dismissed from their jobs and denied re-instatement after giving birth.   The Army would discharge a female soldier once it was determined she was pregnant as well confirming societies views that a mother needs to be home with her children.   Finally marriage was used as their third justification for these limits.   This justification assumes women marry and that the man’s job should be in the public sphere and the woman should remain in the home.   All three of these reasons might have been seen as reasonable in early history because women were treated as a possession but with today’s society none of these justifications hold true.
Today with divorce rate so high and more women are put into the place of single mother raising children alone the need for equality in the workforce is even greater. Since 1955 the number of women in the workforce has risen from 27% to over 70% and mothers with children under six years old have risen from 18% to over 62%.   (InfoPlease).   Men are still paid higher wages than females and generally hold higher positions of authority in the workforce. Women in general...