Women’s Equality Right, Essay Example

The equality movement for women that began several decades ago has progressed and provided many rights. In the United States, women have the authority to vote freely for the candidate of their choosing and may decide whether they want to keep their unborn child in the instance of pregnancy or not. Still, with all of these rights, women are regarded as the lesser half in the workplace. Statistics shows that women are twice as less likely to spearhead large corporations and more likely to earn less in wages than their male counterparts. In many cases, shedding light on disparities brings about change. Such is the hope in this instance.

Among women who are discriminated against the most are mothers. Stephanie Bornstein and her colleagues point out the fact that the United States has the “most family-hostile public policy in the developed world” (1). The authors, along with other professionals in the field, reflect on the lack of support that mothers receive from administration when rearing their children. Moms are expected to be present at work regardless of whether or not a babysitter is at home to care for the children.

Most of the hostility comes from the structure of corporate America. As Bornstein explains, “most European and American workplaces still assume that the committed worker has a family life secured so that family responsibilities do not distract from work obligations. This way of organizing employment around a breadwinner husband and a caregiver housewife, which arose in the late eighteenth century, is severely outdated today. The result is a workplace-workforcemismatch: Many employers still have workplaces perfectly designed for the workforce of 1960” (1). Although the First World has evolved on many levels and moved into a more progressive age where it is not uncommon for women to work for hire, the setup of the workplace, in general, is designed to benefit men. Hence is why the concept of the glass ceiling is so prevalent among career women.

By definition, the glass ceiling is an unofficial barrier that prevents a person from reaching their greatest potential in a corporation. Such barricade often has nothing to do with one’s education or skill since the ceiling often involves a bit of discrimination that places one gender above the other (Sabharwal, 2013 p.4). Regardless of their skill, corporate America men are always placed a step above women. This explains why female chief operating officers are always few. Only those women who shatter the stereotype of men being superior simply because of their gender are seen as those who break through the glass ceiling. Although the concept of going against the grain seems ideal, the struggle that women encounter while trying to be the best at their craft is more intense than one would think (Bombuvela and Chamaru 2015, p.383).

A study conducted by Alison Cook and Christy Glass in 2013 reveals that even Fortune 500 companies that claim to be diverse have difficulty placing women in significant positions that would ordinarily be occupied by men. The research project acknowledges that many minorities,  especially women whose heart desire is to have families of their own, are often prevented from achieving their goals despite being just as qualified, if not more, as the male promoted. Even those corporations with minority leaders are expected to be replaced by supposedly more capable white men.

Unfortunately, the study sheds much light on the uneven scales in corporate America. Whereas men can come with half the skills and effort so that they can be promoted to executive positions, women must prove that they are capable of doing the job more times than one before even being considered for high-ranking roles. While some would argue that the glass ceiling along with its many biases is clear sign that America is a sexist and male-dominated country, the research points to the problem of structures and systems that reward men for perfect attendance while punishing mothers for missing one day of work due to a family emergency. At the same time, however, women are expected to care for their families at home after working several hours on a job and are rarely granted security in the instance of pregnancy.

In the book, The Second Shift: Working Families and the Revolution at Home, Arlie Hochschild, and Anne Machung interviews some high profiled women who share their daily routines before, during and after work. The authors found that, despite their status as breadwinners in the family, well-paid women were still expected to come home and take care of family affairs that their husbands could have handled throughout the day. “I asked who did how much of a variety of household tasks,” (260) shares Hochschild and Machung. “I asked who cooks? Vacuums? Makes the beds? Sews? Cares for plants? Sends Christmas or Hanukkah cards?” The authors noticed that small details of the home were left undone without the mother noticing and doing something about them. In doing something about them, the women placed themselves among the thousands of career moms who attribute thousands more hours to the progress of their homes than the mere hundreds of hours that men contribute to their family after a long day in the office (Wada, 2015, p.94). With such disparities in the workforce present, what can one do about women’s rights in the workforce?

While some believe that transforming the legal system is necessary to give mothers, and women, in general, the rights they are due, granting women more rights in the workplace should begin with individual corporations. Few laws prohibit a company from giving women additional time off during and after expectancy, and there are no government regulations that prevent child daycare facilities in the workplace (Schneider, 2004, p.690). There certainly are no federal rules that place a limit on the amount of wages an employee can receive when completing work-related tasks for a set period. Corporations are, therefore, free to choose the type of treatment they give women who work within their reigns.

The clamor for the equality of all genders in the workplace began during the time of the feminist campaigns. Among the agendas that the first group of feminist fighters and crusaders had, one was a fair treatment of women while at work. This issue has taken years for it to be realized. As discussed above, the equality threshold was achieved at the top government positions. They could not afford to segregate women at this capacity given the magnitude of efforts that the media had devoted to this. This made headlines in all the media houses, giving credit to the campaigners. However, in the low-level jobs in the informal sector, enforcement still faced challenges. Those that raised complaints of mistreatment were either fired of penalized at work. The society was at that time patriarchal, and it became difficult for the government to reverse cultures in a short time (Kohm 2000).

Segregation of women in the workplace was in two forms. One was that women were paid less compared to men even when doing the same job. The proponents of this pay formula argued that women be biologically weaker and hence their input at the workplace was likely to be lower than that of men (Azmat and Petrongolo 2015). Given this case, it became necessary to pay them lower. However, such claims were unfounded since no research and assessment was ever done to weigh on this. Secondly, women hardly got promoted at work as often as men did. This resulted in a workplacewith men in the managerial positions with women occupying the junior ranks. They doubted the ability of women to lead and make key decisions. Even at departmental levels, women’s input at the decision-making table was hardly counted. The gains made so far are tremendous, with women operating on the same platform as their male counterparts.

Abstract

For years, women have experienced discrimination in the workplace. Although they are well qualified to complete complex tasks, women have constantly been ignored for promotions; they continue to hit the glass ceiling instead of breaking the barriers. While many blame such discrimination on individuals, the structure of corporate America is the culprit that prevents women from experiencing full equality in the workplace. A change in such construction, which has not been revisited since its social inception during the nineteenth century, is key to seeing women’s rights flourish in the workforce.

Works Cited

Azmat, Ghazala and Petrongolo, Barbara. ‘Gender and the labor market: Evidence from experiments.’ VOX CEPR’s Political Portal. Accessed on 24 October 2015. Web. http://www.voxeu.org/article/gender-and-labour-market

Bornstein, Stephanie; Williams, Joan; Painter, Genevieve. ‘Discrimination against Mothers Is the Strongest Form of Workplace Gender Discrimination: Lessons from US Caregiver Discrimination Law’ (2012).  International Journal of Comparative Labour Law and Industrial Relations. 2012. Print.

Cook, Alison; Glass, Christy. ‘Above the glass ceiling: When are women and racial/ethnic minorities promoted to CEO?’Strategic Management Journal. 2014. Print.

Hochschild, Arlie; Machung, Anne. The Second Shift: Working Families and the Revolution at Home. Penguin Books. 2012.  Electronic source. http://www.unc.edu/~kleinman/handouts/second%20shift.pdf

Kohm, Lynne. ‘The Rise and Fall of Women ‘s Rights: Have Sexuality and Reproductive Freedom Forfeited Victory?’ William & Mary Journal of Women and the Law, Vol. 6 Iss. 2. William & Mary Law School Scholarship Repository. 2000. Web. http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1232&context=wmjowl

Bombuvela, P.M. and Chamaru, Alvis. ‘Effects of Glass Ceiling on Women Career Development in Private Sector Organizations – Case of Sri Lanka.’ University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka. accessed on 24 October 2015. Web. http://cjournal.cz/files/130.pdf

Sabharwal, Meghna.‘From Glass Ceiling to Glass Cliff: Women in Senior Executive Service.’ Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory. 2013. Print.

Schneider, Elizabeth. ‘Transnational Law as Domestic Resource: Thoughts on the Case of Women’s Rights.’ Anna Hirsch Lecture. 2004. Print.

Wada, Kayomi. ‘The Second Shift: Transcending the Famify/Work Paradigm One Push-Up Bra at a Time. Tahoma West University. Accessed on 24 October 2015. Web. http://digitalcommons.tacoma.uw.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1161&context=tahoma_west