The Occupational Options that Working-Class Women Had in Canada, 1880-1920s - Term Paper Example

?Question7. Discuss the occupational options that working women had in Canada, 1880-1920s. The working women had limited occupational options in Canada in 1880-1920s. After recuperating from the after-effects of the World War One, it was expected that economy would initiate a new chapter for all-around progress by employing new technologies and means of civil institutions ensuring better life for women. Nothing such happened that could bring about positive change in the lives of Canadian women; feminists’ expectations that a new period of economic freedom would herald with the development gained through speedier sophistication in work environment failed in materializing. Canadian women’s hopes of attaining work and promotion on the basis of merit came dashed to the ground as the traditional occupational hierarchy awarding jobs on the assigned lower rank of women was not discarded. Positive changes were expected in the work conditions of women by offering them jobs in such occupations that were considered a male forte earlier. Latest literature on the 1920s indicates that women were not made a part and were not awarded jobs to be benefitted from restructured and modern capitalist practices. Work practices remained partial and discriminatory for women as usual; only types of inequalities in work got changed (Strong-Boag 131). The only blurring line in failures on the part of the government and capitalist economy in not discriminating against women was regarding such professions as women doctors and lawyers, which was a very small chunk; rest of the women faced the same fate of getting employment in non-professional occupations. Career choices for women were limited to blue collar and white collar jobs. Blue collar jobs were related to personal services and manufacturing while the white collar jobs came from the sophisticated industrial state in the logistic and communication, business and finance and clerical areas where a good number of women employees could be seen off late only. There was no scope for equal opportunities in jobs in both types as was expected by the women after the end of the First World War. Women in blue collar jobs were comparatively more exploited than their counterparts in white collar jobs. They also raised their voice against the discrimination at workplace (Strong-Boag 132). One of the occupations considered suitable for women was textile industry wherein the traditional manufacturing processes were suitable for the “family” including besides the male head of the family, the wife and the children as working in a factory. Women got their first jobs nearer their homes and familiar surrounding. It was a practice in the 1920s to offer guide to women on such vocations by the schools, media and employment exchanges, supporting informal traditional work setting as preferable job options. Speedier modernization of Canadian economy during 1880-1920s changed the earlier informal process of taking jobs in traditional “family” settings to formal way of recruiting by following selection criteria. There was pressure from corporate bureaucracies to offer employment as per the social and gender based requirements (Strong-Boag 133-34). Modern Canada offered new and vast range of jobs to women belonging to such professions as stenography, nursing, bee-keeping, millinery, retailing, clerking and telegraph operating. New job opportunities in the Canada of 1920s offered a choice to women belonging to respectable society not to pursue jobs in male job fields like that of a carpenter, electrician, automobile repairing work, and industry such as iron and steel and such similar areas. General perception was that new doors of opportunities in relatively new industry sectors in women’s “own” arena could be of immense non-monetary benefit to women. As per the Ontario manual in schools in 1920s, “The increasing opportunities of girls, both in home-making and paid employment, are likely to become a contributing factor in the humanizing of every form of industry.” Earlier stage of these opportunities offered difficulties, which was admitted by the principal of Toronto’s famous girls’ school, Havergal College. “... Remember, the road will be long and tiresome. There will be plenty of room at the top, but there is no elevator to swing you swiftly aloft; your only access will be steep and stony stairs.” Potential women job seekers were quite optimistic from the reviews of Saturday Night and Maclean’s, the frontline magazines of the decade, that after their study they would be offered good jobs. Women of other occupations were also measuring the new opportunities with optimism. Vocational brochures on garment business were also sure that huge job opportunities were waiting for the talented women (Strong-Boag 134). It was negative attitude of the government that closed the doors of opening new streams in occupations. The government applied the 1919 Technical Education Act, which encouraged only domestic service for weaker sections of women and home focused careers for all women. Latest interesting courses were related to typing and stenography, which could be categorized for girls only but government did not support these career options for women, as it happened in Ontario where all boys were enrolled in study programs “Fundamentals of Business” and “Sociology” and all girls were to be admitted in “Child Welfare” and “Elements of Nursing”. Such discriminatory government level provocations came in the way of opening new occupational horizons for girls (Strong-Boag 135-36). At state level also governments showed the other way to work seeking women by providing them jobs in domestics through the Free Employment Bureaus set up in states in the 1920s. People started using the services of these public bureaus for finding domestic helps as they were used to finding foreign based domestics when availability at home was insufficient (Strong-Boag 136). The limited job options to women in the 1920s is an indication towards the prevalent social trends in the Canadian society where job roles were divided on the basis of gender, therefore job counseling was also given on the lines of social trends. Careers for women were meant in motherhood; going ahead only to the extent of seeking jobs in the marketplace. Jobs were customized by considering the job requirements first of all of the poorer Canadians. It was a common perception in Canadian society that women with sufficient family funds didn’t need jobs and job counseling from the government, as it was meant only for working class, doing specifically domestic jobs, thus, keeping in line with the class and gender hierarchy at job and everywhere. This conservative class based approach saw a slight movement in the 1920s but its impression was in accordance with the gender stereotyping to sidelining the creamy jobs and occupations for “males” only, ousting girls from the prospective job seekers’ list (Strong-Boag 137). The recurrent traditional outlook towards female employment ensured that the Canadian women of the 1920s would tread on the lines of their grandmothers and be segregated to comparatively numbered occupations. In comparison to men who were vastly circularized across wide categories of industries, non-professional women had limited choice of five occupations, namely personal service, manufacturing, logistics and communication, business and finance and clerical. Representation of female labor from these occupations was 73.61 per cent of all female workforce in 1921 and 78.36 per cent in 1931. Employment in these blue and white collar types were featured very often by low wages, temporary work and boring, monotonous tasks. Job mobility happened as a natural result because of the uninteresting and dull job profiles of women. For example women changed their jobs from factory workers to waitresses or from millinery to fruit picking in a span of one year. Although skill, age, marital position, and education were a natural deterrent in random job change but temporary work was the nature of a good number of women’s job record. This recurrent tendency of job change eliminated the division among the six occupations, which would be discussed in detail (Strong-Boag 137). The history of Canada has been one of women employment wherein most of the women had been in personal service than any other individual occupation type. Workers faced small work units, low performance, sub-standard conditions, and uncontrolled powerful management. Jobs like waitresses and domestic service needed fitness and stamina with no need of formal education. It attracted the uneducated girls towards these professions of all age-groups of paid workers. Such jobs were meant for those who had minimum skills and smartness and were in dire need of job (Strong-Boag 137). The demand for waitresses had increased in Canada because of the restaurant dining trend flourishing along the cities. Presence of women in such places had become common particularly in smaller dining places. Another reason of increased demand of waitresses in restaurants was that waitresses were given priority over waiters because they were available in lesser wages to what was offered to waiters. Due to this very reason, a number of competitive businesses such as clothing, textiles, shoes and food processing employed women and girls in their outlets (Strong-Boag 139). The 1920s also saw the new trend of awarding bonuses and the system of working at piece rate to increase production. The additional funds generated were very essential income sources, therefore, speedier work became very crucial to earn although it affected the health of workers by getting over-strained to perform (Strong-Boag 140). The traditional occupations in blue collar category had been strenuous for women. Job seeking and comparatively educated native women were always on the look out for newer white collar jobs but the actual benefits of modern economy were quite far from the Canadian women in bureaucratic corporate capitalist society (Strong-Boag 142). Women’s entry into the logistics and communication occupations in great numbers could become possible with the arrival of the telephone as a mean of communication. The number of telephones almost doubled from 779,000 in December 1919 to 1,383,000 in December 1929. Demand for telephone operators and traffic employers also increased because of manual operations. The expertise of handling switchboard matched well with the talkative and uncreative job profile of women handling well the tensions of controlling bosses, ups and downs of business and clients’ moods. Young Canadian women took the place of male operators to remain and secure place in companies like the Bell Telephone Company of Canada, the Manitoba Tele phone System and the Maritime Telegraph and Telephone Company (Strong-Boag 143). A good segment of women wanted to enter in while collar jobs. They moved into such business areas as business and finance. This industry division has shown an upward trend in women’s jobs, rising 15.4 percent from 1921 to 1931.Women in such industries worked on the counters of department stores and shops, as they were high school pass outs. Male clerks were replaced by sales girls; this trend could be seen since 1880s. With the fashion of department stores and later the chain stores in the 1920s, the need of menial jobs speeded up the replacement of men by women. Although job opportunities were increasing at a fast pace in these industry sectors but it was rare to find a women supervisor or department head, as came out from the findings of the survey of the four Winnipeg department stores employing 2432 to 3200 females. The only highest position given to women was of assistant buyer. One store had a rule that women could not be appointed managers. A similar statement was also made by the journalist Marjory MacMurchy that “…and in somewhat rare cases she may become a buyer.” Situation remained the same till the late 1920s. The road to progress in female careers started in the department stores from parceling to clerical work in the stock room to sales to section-head to sometimes only reaching management level. Senior positions were rarely given to women especially in the smaller stores although women outnumbered men in junior level jobs. Promotions were awarded to women only in their area of expertise like in millinery where all managers were women. Such partial attitude was commonplace as exhibited in Loblaws of Toronto and Carroll's of Hamilton, and drug store chains like G. Tamblyn Company and Louis K. Liggett of Toronto (Strong-Boag 144-145). These occupations justified their discriminatory actions against women by quoting women’s “unseemly” growth in stereotype jobs. The federal government also was a part of such discriminatory practices, as is evident from its institutionalization of bias against women by granting the Civil Service Commission to limit gender competition in 1918. Such policies as Ottawa’s policy on equal pay for equal work had no significance in the absence of equal opportunities; the cause of equality was further affected in 1921 when strict laws were passed on offering employment to married women (Strong-Boag 146). Table I Women's Annual Wages as a Proportion of Men's in Various Occupational Categories, 1921 and 1931 1921 1931 All Occupations 54% 60% Manufacturing 43 44 Transportation & Communication 54 63 Trade 44 40 Finance, Insurance 44 52 Service 39 33 Professional 47 43 Personal 40 38 Laundering, Cleaning, Dyeing 58 Clerical 63 71 SOURCE: Canada, Census, 1921 and 1931. Morality was a big reason on assigning women job responsibilities as traditional roles were considered safer such as domestic work was particularly promoted because of the secure domestic environment. The limitations on servants’ freedom were supported by referring to pseudo-parental care. In factory premises also such limitations of gender communication were put up to discourage “objectionable and constant promiscuous contact with the workmen who [sic] no factory rule can fully control.” Modern approaches were making ways wherein girls were not overly exposed in the moral contexts like others doing different jobs. Training provided to girls was showing its impact on producing more lady-like girls (Strong-Boag 150). Women’s inferiority in the workforce was a deciding factor in showing favors. Modern Canada, it was expected, would not discriminate between male and female workforce but it was all-pervasive in 1920s. White collar women had become just the essential support and part of the new corporate world. Although some blue collar women employees raised their voice against oppression but a good number of them found the escape routes in marriage. The minimum wage legislation was of relief to limited extent for some women employees but there was no relief from the disadvantages women faced in paid labor force. The road to equality was still a long journey for the “Girl of the New Day,” waiting eagerly for the new dawn to appear. Thus, 1920s was a period of gender based discrimination, an essential trait of economic progress after the First World War. Work Cited Strong-Boag, Veronica. “The Girl of the New Day: Canadian Working Women in the 1920s.” Labour / Le Travail, 4 (1979): 131-164. Canadian Committee on Labour History and Athabasca University Press. 15 March 2011 < http://www.jstor.org>. Read More