Emerging Trends in The Social and Behavioral Sciences

Gender and Work

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Gender and Work

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Gender and Work1
CHRISTINE L. WILLIAMS and MEGAN TOBIAS NEELY

Abstract
Over the past 30 years, the US labor market has undergone fundamental structural
changes. In the past, loyal and hardworking employees could expect to spend their
entire careers working for a single employer. But starting in the 1980s, globalization, deregulation, and the decline of unions transformed this standard employment
contract between workers and employers. Today, employment has become more precarious, unstable, and insecure. This essay reviews the limited research on how the
rise of precarious employment in the United States has impacted men and women.
We also analyze the gender implications of policies designed to address precariousness, and set an agenda for future research on gender inequality and precarious work.

INTRODUCTION
Over the past 30 years, the US labor market has undergone fundamental
structural changes. Since the 1980s, globalization, deregulation, and the
decline of unions have rewritten the standard employment contract between
workers and employers. In the past, many workers could expect to spend
their working lives with a single employer, climbing a career ladder and
earning steadily increasing wages and growing retirement pensions in
return for their loyalty and hard work. Today, employment has become
more precarious, unstable, and insecure. Downsizing, outsourcing, and
subcontracting have eliminated many jobs in manufacturing, while job
growth has been concentrated mostly in the low-wage service sector, where
many jobs are temporary and part-time.
Men have been hardest hit by these changes. A whopping 74% of the workers who lost their jobs at the start of the Great Recession of 2008 were men
(Boushey, 2009), leading some commentators to describe the economic crisis as a “mancession” (Standing, 2011). Unemployment rates for men and
women have since converged, but the gendered consequences of the changes
wrought by the so-called new economy are not fully understood. Our goal
1. The authors thank Caitlyn Collins, Kirsten Dellinger, Jennifer Glass, Ken-Hou Lin, Allison Pugh,
Sharmila Rudrappa, Katie Sobering, and Jessica Thomas for their thoughtful advice and suggestions.
Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences. Edited by Robert Scott and Stephen Kosslyn.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. ISBN 978-1-118-90077-2.

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in this essay is to review the limited research on how the rise of precarious
employment has impacted men and women, to analyze the gender implications of policies designed to address precariousness, and to set an agenda for
future research on gender inequality and precarious work.
FOUNDATIONAL RESEARCH ON PRECARIOUS WORK
Sociologists agree that jobs in the formal economy have become more precarious over the past 30 years (although there is some disagreement about the
extent of this change). Arne Kalleberg (2011, p. 86) writes that “virtually all
jobs are now more unstable as insecurity permeates the entire occupational
structure.” The evidence he provides includes growth in nonstandard
employment (such as part-time and temporary jobs), decreases in employee
tenure, heightened employee perceptions of job insecurity, and increases
in involuntary job loss and long-term unemployment. In Kalleberg’s view,
precarious working conditions have increased because of globalization,
deregulation, and reduced institutional protections for workers. Previously,
precariousness was specific to low-wage jobs (including jobs in the informal
economy), but now all sectors of the labor market have been impacted,
including professional and managerial jobs.
Some sociologists include an assessment of job quality in their definition
of precarious work. For example, Leah Vosko (2010) notes that, unlike workers in other industrialized nations, US workers have no statutory claim to
job security even if they are employed in “permanent” (as opposed to temporary) full-time positions. Also, in contrast to workers abroad, US workers
typically rely on their jobs for access to health care and pensions. According
to Vosko, increasing precariousness is reflected in the deterioration of these
benefits over time, as workers today are required to pay all or part of the cost
of their health insurance and retirement plans. Wages have also stagnated for
most workers despite their increasing productivity. Her main point, then, is
that precariousness is increasing even in seemingly secure full-time positions
owing to the declining quality of jobs in this country.
Although there is some dispute between sociologists and economists about
the extent of these changes, all agree that the perception of job precariousness
has grown, and that this has impacted workers’ sense of well-being. Anxiety
about job security and stability is strong in the United States (Kalleberg,
2011). Vicki Smith (2010) describes an “employment culture of insecurity”
inflamed by media accounts of long-term unemployment, driving even
those in full-time jobs to worry about their future prospects. As firms
dismantle traditional career ladders, workers must seek opportunities for
advancement outside of their organization. Surviving today’s turbulent
economy, she argues, requires them to spend considerable time and energy

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updating their skills, developing their networks, and researching opportunities in the labor market. Those without jobs must constantly reinvent
themselves to enhance their employability—the term she uses to describe the
individual effort required to appear desirable and trustworthy in the eyes of
potential employers.
Carrie Lane (2011) analyzes the employability projects of long-term
unemployed workers in the high-tech industry. She finds that these
workers embrace a neoliberal ideology that celebrates individualism and
entrepreneurship. This ideology, she writes, “naturalizes the absence of
secure, long-term employment, casts the resulting insecurity as an empowering alternative to dependence on a single employer, and prescribes explicitly
individualist, apolitical, pro-market means by which one can best position
oneself to succeed in an increasingly global and competitive world” (p. 13).
This ideology may bolster the optimism and self-esteem of job seekers
during long bouts of unemployment, but it is based on a myth. Although
these unemployed professionals glorify the independent entrepreneur, Lane
exposes their financial and emotional dependence on their families, who
absorb the costs of their retraining and networking. She argues that the
contradictions they experience between the ideology of self-sufficiency and
the reality of dependence often lead to depression and divorce.
The works of Smith, Lane, and others suggest that precariousness is not
only a characteristic of work in the new economy. Precariousness is part of
the cultural zeitgeist, a widespread belief and sensibility that is hegemonic in
society. Workers have become convinced of the logic and inevitability of job
insecurity. But instead of fighting against the (real or imagined) degradation
of their jobs, workers sympathize with their employers, who appear powerless in the face of competitive global capitalism. Even unionized workers
feel compelled to give concessions just to keep their jobs. In order to stay at
the forefront of an insecure job market, Americans of all types are flocking to
the entrepreneurial self-help movement, where they learn corporate marketing strategies to develop a personal “brand” as a bulwark against economic
vulnerability (Vallas & Cummins, 2014).
However, the picture is not entirely bleak. Not everyone is suffering in the
era of precariousness. Kalleberg (2011) emphasizes that there are winners
in the new economy, in particular workers with specialized skills in high
demand. But who are these winners and losers? And how do gender dynamics shape the experience of job precariousness in the new economy?
CUTTING-EDGE RESEARCH: GENDER AND PRECARIOUS WORK
For the most part, studies of precarious work do not consider gender. But
men and women workers have been impacted differently by the spread of

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precariousness in the new economy. As noted earlier, the structural changes
wrought by the new economy appear to have hit men hardest. However, it
is not the case that women are doing better than men, nor is it the case that
all men have been negatively impacted.
White working class men have experienced the steepest declines because
they have lost certain advantages they previously enjoyed. The origins
of these advantages lie in the post-World War II economy. The standard
employment contract that provided job security in return for loyal work was
developed in the 1940s and 1950s during the so-called golden age of capitalism (Reich, 2007). A product of an unprecedented collaboration between
the US government, business, and unions, this contract was available only
to a select group of employees—mostly white male workers employed
by large oligopolistic firms. The “family wage” was a cornerstone of this
contract. Acknowledging their dependence on women’s domestic work,
male union members fought for and received an income deemed adequate
to support a wife and children at home. Importantly, union members and
employers excluded women and racial/ethnic minority men from receiving
the family wage.
Thus, the “standard” employment contract was in fact a gendered and
racialized contract (Vosko, 2010). It was based on the shared belief that men
should be the family breadwinner and women’s place is in the home. During
the “golden age,” married women were not supposed to work at all; those
who did work were forced to do so because their husbands were prevented
from earning the family wage. The few jobs that were open to women rarely
offered security, career ladders, or benefits. These jobs were designed to be
temporary or part-time, providing low wages and limited opportunities for
advancement. This was true not only of jobs in the service sector—such as
domestic, retail, and clerical work—but also those in the so-called women’s
professions. Until they were overturned in the 1970s, laws required women
teachers and nurses to leave their jobs when they married and had children
(Thistle, 2006).
Not surprisingly, as globalization, deregulation, and outsourcing began to
whittle away the terms of the standard employment contract, working class
men experienced the greatest declines. African American and Latino men
who managed to make headway into unionized jobs before the 1970s were
the first groups hit by deindustrialization, a trend that has now impacted
white working class men as well. Over the past 30 years, their jobs have
become increasingly precarious—that is, more similar to women’s jobs. In
fact, some commentators describe this deterioration of men’s jobs as the
“feminization of labor” (Standing, 2011). This does not imply that women
today encounter better working conditions than men, but that many of the

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advantages men—primarily white working class men—previously enjoyed
in the workplace are disappearing.
These disappearing advantages are reflected in a number of statistical
trends. Significant gaps between men’s and women’s rates of labor force
participation, job tenure, and perceived job insecurity are closing (Kalleberg,
2011). The earnings gap for men and women has also decreased, but for
reasons that are different for workers at the lower and upper strata of the
labor force. On the one hand, the gender wage gap for workers at the middle
and lower tiers of the labor force declined because men’s wages dropped
precipitously. For example, the median income of male high school graduates aged 25–34 fell 25%, from $41,000 in 1980, to $31,000 in 2010 (in constant
dollars); women high school graduates in this age group experienced a
decline from $26,500 to $24,000 over the same time period (Pedulla, 2012, p.
29). Thus, the ratio of women’s earnings to men’s earnings for this group
narrowed, from 0.65 to 0.77, but it would be a gross misrepresentation to
call this an improvement in women’s status. Instead, it indicates a decline in
men’s status due to the demise of the standard employment contract.
In contrast, the incomes of college educated men and women have steadily
increased over the past 30 years. Women have closed the education gap with
men; they now outnumber men on college campuses where they receive the
majority of degrees (England, 2010). Kalleberg (2011, p. 106) shows that the
incomes of men and women in the top 5% of income earners have increased
significantly, with men’s wages growing from $39/h in 1973 to $55/h in 2009
(in constant dollars), and women’s growing from $24 to $41 over the same
time period (the corresponding ratios are 0.62 and 0.75). For this group of
elite workers, the declining gender wage gap is due to the steeper rise of
women’s incomes compared to men’s.
Thus, the rise in precariousness has had uneven effects. For the majority
of workers, job quality has deteriorated, a change felt most keenly by men
without college degrees. For those at the top, the new economy has been a
boon—although a significant gender wage gap still exists. But who are these
winners? What do we know about gender dynamics at the top of the labor
market?
At the very top, of course, the winners are virtually all men. In 2013, only
23 Fortune 500 companies were headed by women (catalyst.org). Executive
compensation has soared during the period of rising precariousness. And
although executive turnover is also high, job dislocation at the top is softened
by generous separation packages, often referred to as golden parachutes. While
we know that men are overrepresented at the very top, very little is known
about the organizational processes that exclude women from these positions.
Of course, most high earners are not CEOs. They are managers and
professionals concentrated in male-dominated occupations. The increase in

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women’s incomes since 1980 is due almost entirely to women’s movement
into these male-dominated jobs (England, 2010).
These elite workers are typically required to work very long hours (Correll,
Kelly, O’Connor, & Williams, 2014), in stark contrast to workers at the
bottom, who struggle to get more hours (Lambert, 2012). In the current economy, employers treat exempt (salaried) and nonexempt (hourly) workers
differently—hiring too many at the bottom and too few at the top. In the
employment culture of insecurity, salaried professionals may feel compelled
to work long hours to prove their worth to their employers in an effort to
avoid being laid off. This overwork is facilitated by new communications
technology that makes workers available to their employers around the
clock. Those with specialized skills may choose to become consultants or
start their own businesses, but these strategies can expose them to even
greater precariousness and exacerbate the problem of overwork.
The requirement to work long hours has consequences for gender inequality because women continue to retain primary responsibility for child care.
Although elite workers can outsource childcare (often to immigrant women
in low-paid precarious jobs), many women choose to “opt out,” or quit
their jobs instead. Youngjoo Cha (2010) found that mothers married to men
who work long hours are the group most likely to pursue this “opt out”
strategy. The opposite is not true (fathers do not opt out when their wives
overwork). Thus “opting out” is a coping strategy for married women
with high-earning husbands, a small and privileged group. However, it is
possible that for some of these women “opting out” is a gendered cover
story to hide job displacement. When women face the threat of layoffs,
they may claim to leave work voluntarily to look after children in order
to increase their “employability”—making their absence from work seem
legitimate in the eyes of future employers.
Working women across the income spectrum feel torn between the
demands of employment and the demands of motherhood, but most women
do not have the option of quitting their jobs. Despite the rhetoric of women’s
liberation, married women entered the labor force in large numbers because
men’s salaries dropped (Thistle, 2006). Surviving the culture of employment
insecurity for most households requires two incomes, so that the earnings of
one spouse can act as a buffer in case the other is laid off. However, because
most household costs (rent/mortgage, bills) require both incomes, the fix is
only temporary. In a sense, insecurity is doubled in dual-earner households,
as there is no homemaker who can enter the market if the breadwinner
falters.
Single mothers and their children are especially vulnerable in the era of
employment precariousness. While the economic situation of single mothers
has always been tenuous in the United States, their situation has worsened

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in recent years because of the erosion of the social safety net, and in particular diminishing welfare benefits. To receive public assistance today, poor
mothers must participate in paid work or job training (to enhance their “employability”). But the jobs available to them pay very low wages. In fact,
many of these “workfare” jobs are exempt from the requirement that they pay
the federal minimum wage. Moreover, as hourly workers, they are expected
to be available at any time—to work late at short notice or to work nonstandard hours. Low-wage employers are allowed to expand and contract
working hours depending on customer traffic. (US workers have a right to
minimum wages, but not minimum hours.) Single mothers unable to cope
with erratic schedules are consequently forced to forfeit their meager welfare
benefits (Collins & Mayer, 2010).
The incompatibility between the demands of unpaid domestic care
work and precarious paid work is provoking a crisis of social reproduction. Social reproduction refers to the labor necessary to keep households
functioning—the work required to raise children, care for the sick and
elderly, and tend to the upkeep of house and home. In the “golden age,”
this reproductive labor was performed by married women who were
supported by the “family wage” their husbands received. This bargain
was largely limited to white families; racial/ethnic minority families were
excluded, forcing married women into low-wage jobs to make ends meet.
Today, all families are left on their own to survive. In this era of precarious
employment, maintaining a livelihood is increasingly incompatible with
raising children. As a result of this tension, two societal-level consequences
are likely: (i) increasing poverty and income inequality and (ii) declining
fertility (Esping-Andersen, 2009). Both are occurring in the United States.
The increasing income gap is well known here; less apparent is the declining fertility rate because it has been obscured by immigration patterns.
Discounting the births to first-generation immigrants, the US fertility rate
would fall further below replacement level and look similar to rates in
Europe, which average about 1.6 births per woman.
CONTEMPORARY RESPONSES TO PRECARIOUS WORK
The increase in precariousness has not been a rallying point for US workers.
The “Occupy” movement, for example, targeted increasing income inequality but not the problems of job insecurity and declining job quality. In Europe,
by contrast, there is considerable talk of the growing “precariat” (Standing
2010), an eclectic class of workers who are disgruntled by the rise of insecurity in the labor market. Their activism has spurred a variety of responses to
precariousness. Here we review their implications for gender inequality.

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In some cases, the rise of precariousness has stirred a nostalgic longing for
a return to the standard employment contract. Because this would entail a
return to the traditional gender division of labor, some feminists have been
wary of this particular response. In Italy, for example, young feminists argue
that precariousness might not be all bad. They disavow the “stability” of their
mothers’ generation, wanting nothing of the stresses of “balancing” paid
work and unpaid domestic work. In their view, temporary work contracts
are not problematic per se; low pay at work and the continued exploitation
of women’s unpaid labor in the home are the focus of their organizing efforts
(Fantone, 2007).
Some have argued that the standard employment contract is no longer
feasible precisely because it relies on the unpaid domestic labor of women.
Unlike the economy of the 1950s, the economy today depends on women’s
participation in the paid labor force. Moreover, some argue that the “home”
can no longer provide its traditional function of offering respite and regeneration to workers due to the “economization” of society. Lisa Adkins (2012,
pp. 622–623) explains that economization is “the folding of the economy into
society,” a process occurring as “productive and value-creating activities
[move] away from the formal workplace” and become dispersed “across
the social body.” This process is well under way, as technology is making
workers available to their employers 24/7, domestic work is becoming
thoroughly commodified, and the unemployed are busily enhancing their
employability. In this context—where we work even when we are not
working—the standard employment contract is hopelessly anachronistic.
Two forward-looking alternatives to the current precariousness are
“flexicurity” and “beyond employment.” Flexicurity is a labor policy first
introduced in Denmark that provides both flexibility for employers (allowing them to hire and fire workers as needed) and security for workers (in the
form of generous benefits and opportunities for retraining during periods
of unemployment). Flexicurity is a “win-win” proposition, according to
Kalleberg (2011, p. 183), because it addresses the needs of both employers
and workers in the context of competitive global capitalism. However,
the flexicurity model does not address gender inequality. It assumes that
the work of social reproduction will be carried out either by paid workers
outside the home (e.g., day care employees) or unpaid caregivers in the
home who rely on an employed partner to support them (e.g., stay-at-home
mothers). Just as in the standard employment contract, in the flexicurity
approach, the individual’s economic well-being depends on his or her labor
force participation. Those who are not in the labor force receive no benefits
even if they are engaged in the important work of social reproduction. Thus,
this approach does not address gender inequality stemming from the double
burden of women’s work.

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Although not a part of the “flexicurity” approach, some scholars advocate
for increased workplace flexibility to facilitate the combining of women’s
domestic and paid work. Policies such as part-time schedules, telecommuting, and flextime, it is argued, can enable women (and ideally, men as well)
to maintain their labor force participation while also performing domestic
work. Ironically, these forms of flexibility already characterize many precarious low-wage jobs, albeit under the control of employers and not workers.
In other words, low-wage employers get to determine the time and place of
work without regard for workers’ needs (schedules are flexible for employers, not employees). But advocates maintain that instituting flexible work
policies in professional careers can help women to “balance” their work and
family responsibilities (Correll et al., 2014).
There are a number of problems with this approach. First, research suggests that women’s careers suffer if they take advantage of these policies
(Glass, 2004). Second, women may be especially reluctant to ask for or take
advantage of these policies in an era of job precariousness, fearing that to
do so will jeopardize their employment. Third, it is unlikely that, if implemented, these policies would be under the control of workers. A recent study
of telecommuting, for example, confirms that employers control the conditions of telecommuting and are its primary beneficiaries (Noonan & Glass,
2012). Finally, these policies do not actually lessen women’s total amount of
labor; they merely shift the distribution of women’s time from fewer paid
hours to more unpaid hours of work. Thus, it is unlikely that institutionalizing increased workplace flexibility will mitigate gender inequality.
A more radical solution to precariousness is the “beyond employment”
approach, which seeks to uncouple employment status and social well-being
(Vosko, 2010). This approach originated from a group of experts convened by
the European Commission. It is based on the idea that it is in society’s best
interest to enable individuals to move in and out of the labor force at different points in their lives, depending on their caregiving responsibilities and
their personal needs for care and training. But instead of workers bearing
the risks and costs of fulfilling these needs, the state and employers should
take on these costs. In this model, economic well-being is not tied to market activity, but to valued contributions to society, including raising children.
A worker who drops out of the labor force to raise children is treated no
differently than a worker who is laid off or otherwise experiences discontinuities in employment due to precariousness: All workers who are involved in
socially necessary labor would be guaranteed income replacement. This “beyond employment” model aims to break down the breadwinner–homemaker
division by imagining a “universal caregiver” norm, under which a more
equitable distribution of unpaid work is prescribed and “all jobs are designed

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on the assumption that workers are caregivers, shortening hours of work for
pay across-the-board” (Vosko, 2010, p. 222).
The “beyond employment” model has flaws. Unless it includes support
for publicly funded child care, it may not empower women in the market.
Instead, the model could encourage women to take on (state-subsidized)
caregiver roles while men continue to engage in paid work with some
support in-between precarious jobs. Moreover, the implementation of
shorter maximum work hours, which is a key to this approach, may not
be enforceable given the ubiquity of communications technologies that
expand the working day. Although not perfect, this “beyond employment”
approach nevertheless offers a vision of gender equality, making it unique
among the proposed alternatives to the current state of precariousness.
KEY ISSUES FOR FUTURE RESEARCH ON PRECARIOUSNESS
AND GENDER INEQUALITY
Scholars examining poverty have long studied precariousness, especially in
communities of color. Now that precariousness has spread throughout the
economy, it has become a new focus of research in the sociology of work.
Scholars are just beginning to study the implications of precariousness for
gender inequality. The literature we have reviewed has many gaps that call
out for additional research.
First, we need better measures of precariousness. As we have discussed, the
quantitative data are indicating a convergence of men’s and women’s experiences, but these numbers are contested. It may be the case that the degree
of precariousness in women’s jobs is underestimated because of the ways
that the information is gathered and analyzed. As suggested earlier, women
may claim to be “opting out” in response to the threat of layoffs. Moreover,
they may call their part-time work “voluntary” because their domestic duties
are onerous (researchers typically include only the “involuntary” part-time
workers in their measures of precariousness). More research is needed to
uncover the conditions under which women’s “voluntary” choices are made.
Researchers should not assume that because women make the choice to opt
out or work part-time that they are not impacted by precariousness.
Second, we need more research on how gender inequality shapes the
process of finding job opportunities in the new economy. Under the regime
of precariousness, people obtain jobs through networks, unpaid internships, and temporary employment services. Men and women may face
different challenges navigating these new pathways to work (Williams,
Muller, & Kilanski, 2012). The need for self-“branding” and self-promotion
in order to secure work may also be experienced differently by men and
women. For example, it may not be feasible for women to assimilate the

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neoliberal ideology in the same ways it is embraced by men (Lane, 2011).
Because this ideology is based on the assumption that workers are free to
move, change jobs, and be available at any time to their employers, it is
likely to be incompatible with the experiences of women with caregiving
responsibilities.
Third, more information is needed about precarious work in the informal economy. The research we have reviewed is all based on changing
employment conditions in the formal sector. But one of the most precarious
forms of employment is day-labor. Day-laborers are employed in a variety
of industries, including construction, agriculture, domestic work, and sex
work. Some workers are forced into these jobs because the state excludes
them from formal sector jobs on the basis of their immigration status or
criminal records. Others have no other options for work because employers
discriminate against them, for example, on the basis of race or gender
presentation. Because they work “off the books,” these day-laborers do not
appear in the quantitative data used to measure and analyze precariousness.
Because racial/ethnic minorities are overrepresented among day-laborers,
scholars can overlook the ways that the experience of precariousness is not
only gendered but racialized. We need more studies exploring the ways that
precarious conditions in these jobs impact men and women differently.
Finally, more research is needed on alternatives to the standard employment contract. The problems with precarious work that US workers are
facing are being addressed by different welfare states. Comparative and
transnational research on the experiences of workers under different policy
regimes in Europe and elsewhere could help guide US labor market policy
and worker activism.
Periods of economic crises can elicit nostalgic yearning for an idealized
“golden” past, but they also can be opportunities to rewrite the gender contract and imagine a future of gender equality. As we hope to have demonstrated, women’s interests must be part of any discussion of the future of
precarious work.
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of the American Sociological Associatio, San Francisco.
Vosko, L. F. (2010). Managing the margins: Gender, citizenship, and the international regulation of precarious employment. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
Williams, C., Muller, C., & Kilanski, K. (2012). Gendered organizations in the new
economy. Gender & Society, 25(4), 549–573.

CHRISTINE L. WILLIAMS SHORT BIOGRAPHY
Christine L. Williams is professor and chair of sociology at the University
of Texas at Austin, where she teaches courses in gender, sexuality, labor and
labor movements, and qualitative research methods. She has written extensively on gender, race, and class inequality in a variety of workplace settings.
http://www.utexas.edu/cola/depts/sociology/faculty/clwillia

Gender and Work

13

MEGAN TOBIAS NEELY SHORT BIOGRAPHY
Megan Tobias Neely is a graduate student in the sociology department at
the University of Texas at Austin. Her research interests are in gender, race,
and class inequality in the workplace. She is currently working on her dissertation research on gender, organizations, and work in the finance industry.
http://www.utexas.edu/cola/depts/sociology/graduate/gradstudents/
profile.php?id=mtn497
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Gender and Work1
CHRISTINE L. WILLIAMS and MEGAN TOBIAS NEELY

Abstract
Over the past 30 years, the US labor market has undergone fundamental structural
changes. In the past, loyal and hardworking employees could expect to spend their
entire careers working for a single employer. But starting in the 1980s, globalization, deregulation, and the decline of unions transformed this standard employment
contract between workers and employers. Today, employment has become more precarious, unstable, and insecure. This essay reviews the limited research on how the
rise of precarious employment in the United States has impacted men and women.
We also analyze the gender implications of policies designed to address precariousness, and set an agenda for future research on gender inequality and precarious work.

INTRODUCTION
Over the past 30 years, the US labor market has undergone fundamental
structural changes. Since the 1980s, globalization, deregulation, and the
decline of unions have rewritten the standard employment contract between
workers and employers. In the past, many workers could expect to spend
their working lives with a single employer, climbing a career ladder and
earning steadily increasing wages and growing retirement pensions in
return for their loyalty and hard work. Today, employment has become
more precarious, unstable, and insecure. Downsizing, outsourcing, and
subcontracting have eliminated many jobs in manufacturing, while job
growth has been concentrated mostly in the low-wage service sector, where
many jobs are temporary and part-time.
Men have been hardest hit by these changes. A whopping 74% of the workers who lost their jobs at the start of the Great Recession of 2008 were men
(Boushey, 2009), leading some commentators to describe the economic crisis as a “mancession” (Standing, 2011). Unemployment rates for men and
women have since converged, but the gendered consequences of the changes
wrought by the so-called new economy are not fully understood. Our goal
1. The authors thank Caitlyn Collins, Kirsten Dellinger, Jennifer Glass, Ken-Hou Lin, Allison Pugh,
Sharmila Rudrappa, Katie Sobering, and Jessica Thomas for their thoughtful advice and suggestions.
Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences. Edited by Robert Scott and Stephen Kosslyn.
© 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. ISBN 978-1-118-90077-2.

1

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

in this essay is to review the limited research on how the rise of precarious
employment has impacted men and women, to analyze the gender implications of policies designed to address precariousness, and to set an agenda for
future research on gender inequality and precarious work.
FOUNDATIONAL RESEARCH ON PRECARIOUS WORK
Sociologists agree that jobs in the formal economy have become more precarious over the past 30 years (although there is some disagreement about the
extent of this change). Arne Kalleberg (2011, p. 86) writes that “virtually all
jobs are now more unstable as insecurity permeates the entire occupational
structure.” The evidence he provides includes growth in nonstandard
employment (such as part-time and temporary jobs), decreases in employee
tenure, heightened employee perceptions of job insecurity, and increases
in involuntary job loss and long-term unemployment. In Kalleberg’s view,
precarious working conditions have increased because of globalization,
deregulation, and reduced institutional protections for workers. Previously,
precariousness was specific to low-wage jobs (including jobs in the informal
economy), but now all sectors of the labor market have been impacted,
including professional and managerial jobs.
Some sociologists include an assessment of job quality in their definition
of precarious work. For example, Leah Vosko (2010) notes that, unlike workers in other industrialized nations, US workers have no statutory claim to
job security even if they are employed in “permanent” (as opposed to temporary) full-time positions. Also, in contrast to workers abroad, US workers
typically rely on their jobs for access to health care and pensions. According
to Vosko, increasing precariousness is reflected in the deterioration of these
benefits over time, as workers today are required to pay all or part of the cost
of their health insurance and retirement plans. Wages have also stagnated for
most workers despite their increasing productivity. Her main point, then, is
that precariousness is increasing even in seemingly secure full-time positions
owing to the declining quality of jobs in this country.
Although there is some dispute between sociologists and economists about
the extent of these changes, all agree that the perception of job precariousness
has grown, and that this has impacted workers’ sense of well-being. Anxiety
about job security and stability is strong in the United States (Kalleberg,
2011). Vicki Smith (2010) describes an “employment culture of insecurity”
inflamed by media accounts of long-term unemployment, driving even
those in full-time jobs to worry about their future prospects. As firms
dismantle traditional career ladders, workers must seek opportunities for
advancement outside of their organization. Surviving today’s turbulent
economy, she argues, requires them to spend considerable time and energy

Gender and Work

3

updating their skills, developing their networks, and researching opportunities in the labor market. Those without jobs must constantly reinvent
themselves to enhance their employability—the term she uses to describe the
individual effort required to appear desirable and trustworthy in the eyes of
potential employers.
Carrie Lane (2011) analyzes the employability projects of long-term
unemployed workers in the high-tech industry. She finds that these
workers embrace a neoliberal ideology that celebrates individualism and
entrepreneurship. This ideology, she writes, “naturalizes the absence of
secure, long-term employment, casts the resulting insecurity as an empowering alternative to dependence on a single employer, and prescribes explicitly
individualist, apolitical, pro-market means by which one can best position
oneself to succeed in an increasingly global and competitive world” (p. 13).
This ideology may bolster the optimism and self-esteem of job seekers
during long bouts of unemployment, but it is based on a myth. Although
these unemployed professionals glorify the independent entrepreneur, Lane
exposes their financial and emotional dependence on their families, who
absorb the costs of their retraining and networking. She argues that the
contradictions they experience between the ideology of self-sufficiency and
the reality of dependence often lead to depression and divorce.
The works of Smith, Lane, and others suggest that precariousness is not
only a characteristic of work in the new economy. Precariousness is part of
the cultural zeitgeist, a widespread belief and sensibility that is hegemonic in
society. Workers have become convinced of the logic and inevitability of job
insecurity. But instead of fighting against the (real or imagined) degradation
of their jobs, workers sympathize with their employers, who appear powerless in the face of competitive global capitalism. Even unionized workers
feel compelled to give concessions just to keep their jobs. In order to stay at
the forefront of an insecure job market, Americans of all types are flocking to
the entrepreneurial self-help movement, where they learn corporate marketing strategies to develop a personal “brand” as a bulwark against economic
vulnerability (Vallas & Cummins, 2014).
However, the picture is not entirely bleak. Not everyone is suffering in the
era of precariousness. Kalleberg (2011) emphasizes that there are winners
in the new economy, in particular workers with specialized skills in high
demand. But who are these winners and losers? And how do gender dynamics shape the experience of job precariousness in the new economy?
CUTTING-EDGE RESEARCH: GENDER AND PRECARIOUS WORK
For the most part, studies of precarious work do not consider gender. But
men and women workers have been impacted differently by the spread of

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

precariousness in the new economy. As noted earlier, the structural changes
wrought by the new economy appear to have hit men hardest. However, it
is not the case that women are doing better than men, nor is it the case that
all men have been negatively impacted.
White working class men have experienced the steepest declines because
they have lost certain advantages they previously enjoyed. The origins
of these advantages lie in the post-World War II economy. The standard
employment contract that provided job security in return for loyal work was
developed in the 1940s and 1950s during the so-called golden age of capitalism (Reich, 2007). A product of an unprecedented collaboration between
the US government, business, and unions, this contract was available only
to a select group of employees—mostly white male workers employed
by large oligopolistic firms. The “family wage” was a cornerstone of this
contract. Acknowledging their dependence on women’s domestic work,
male union members fought for and received an income deemed adequate
to support a wife and children at home. Importantly, union members and
employers excluded women and racial/ethnic minority men from receiving
the family wage.
Thus, the “standard” employment contract was in fact a gendered and
racialized contract (Vosko, 2010). It was based on the shared belief that men
should be the family breadwinner and women’s place is in the home. During
the “golden age,” married women were not supposed to work at all; those
who did work were forced to do so because their husbands were prevented
from earning the family wage. The few jobs that were open to women rarely
offered security, career ladders, or benefits. These jobs were designed to be
temporary or part-time, providing low wages and limited opportunities for
advancement. This was true not only of jobs in the service sector—such as
domestic, retail, and clerical work—but also those in the so-called women’s
professions. Until they were overturned in the 1970s, laws required women
teachers and nurses to leave their jobs when they married and had children
(Thistle, 2006).
Not surprisingly, as globalization, deregulation, and outsourcing began to
whittle away the terms of the standard employment contract, working class
men experienced the greatest declines. African American and Latino men
who managed to make headway into unionized jobs before the 1970s were
the first groups hit by deindustrialization, a trend that has now impacted
white working class men as well. Over the past 30 years, their jobs have
become increasingly precarious—that is, more similar to women’s jobs. In
fact, some commentators describe this deterioration of men’s jobs as the
“feminization of labor” (Standing, 2011). This does not imply that women
today encounter better working conditions than men, but that many of the

Gender and Work

5

advantages men—primarily white working class men—previously enjoyed
in the workplace are disappearing.
These disappearing advantages are reflected in a number of statistical
trends. Significant gaps between men’s and women’s rates of labor force
participation, job tenure, and perceived job insecurity are closing (Kalleberg,
2011). The earnings gap for men and women has also decreased, but for
reasons that are different for workers at the lower and upper strata of the
labor force. On the one hand, the gender wage gap for workers at the middle
and lower tiers of the labor force declined because men’s wages dropped
precipitously. For example, the median income of male high school graduates aged 25–34 fell 25%, from $41,000 in 1980, to $31,000 in 2010 (in constant
dollars); women high school graduates in this age group experienced a
decline from $26,500 to $24,000 over the same time period (Pedulla, 2012, p.
29). Thus, the ratio of women’s earnings to men’s earnings for this group
narrowed, from 0.65 to 0.77, but it would be a gross misrepresentation to
call this an improvement in women’s status. Instead, it indicates a decline in
men’s status due to the demise of the standard employment contract.
In contrast, the incomes of college educated men and women have steadily
increased over the past 30 years. Women have closed the education gap with
men; they now outnumber men on college campuses where they receive the
majority of degrees (England, 2010). Kalleberg (2011, p. 106) shows that the
incomes of men and women in the top 5% of income earners have increased
significantly, with men’s wages growing from $39/h in 1973 to $55/h in 2009
(in constant dollars), and women’s growing from $24 to $41 over the same
time period (the corresponding ratios are 0.62 and 0.75). For this group of
elite workers, the declining gender wage gap is due to the steeper rise of
women’s incomes compared to men’s.
Thus, the rise in precariousness has had uneven effects. For the majority
of workers, job quality has deteriorated, a change felt most keenly by men
without college degrees. For those at the top, the new economy has been a
boon—although a significant gender wage gap still exists. But who are these
winners? What do we know about gender dynamics at the top of the labor
market?
At the very top, of course, the winners are virtually all men. In 2013, only
23 Fortune 500 companies were headed by women (catalyst.org). Executive
compensation has soared during the period of rising precariousness. And
although executive turnover is also high, job dislocation at the top is softened
by generous separation packages, often referred to as golden parachutes. While
we know that men are overrepresented at the very top, very little is known
about the organizational processes that exclude women from these positions.
Of course, most high earners are not CEOs. They are managers and
professionals concentrated in male-dominated occupations. The increase in

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

women’s incomes since 1980 is due almost entirely to women’s movement
into these male-dominated jobs (England, 2010).
These elite workers are typically required to work very long hours (Correll,
Kelly, O’Connor, & Williams, 2014), in stark contrast to workers at the
bottom, who struggle to get more hours (Lambert, 2012). In the current economy, employers treat exempt (salaried) and nonexempt (hourly) workers
differently—hiring too many at the bottom and too few at the top. In the
employment culture of insecurity, salaried professionals may feel compelled
to work long hours to prove their worth to their employers in an effort to
avoid being laid off. This overwork is facilitated by new communications
technology that makes workers available to their employers around the
clock. Those with specialized skills may choose to become consultants or
start their own businesses, but these strategies can expose them to even
greater precariousness and exacerbate the problem of overwork.
The requirement to work long hours has consequences for gender inequality because women continue to retain primary responsibility for child care.
Although elite workers can outsource childcare (often to immigrant women
in low-paid precarious jobs), many women choose to “opt out,” or quit
their jobs instead. Youngjoo Cha (2010) found that mothers married to men
who work long hours are the group most likely to pursue this “opt out”
strategy. The opposite is not true (fathers do not opt out when their wives
overwork). Thus “opting out” is a coping strategy for married women
with high-earning husbands, a small and privileged group. However, it is
possible that for some of these women “opting out” is a gendered cover
story to hide job displacement. When women face the threat of layoffs,
they may claim to leave work voluntarily to look after children in order
to increase their “employability”—making their absence from work seem
legitimate in the eyes of future employers.
Working women across the income spectrum feel torn between the
demands of employment and the demands of motherhood, but most women
do not have the option of quitting their jobs. Despite the rhetoric of women’s
liberation, married women entered the labor force in large numbers because
men’s salaries dropped (Thistle, 2006). Surviving the culture of employment
insecurity for most households requires two incomes, so that the earnings of
one spouse can act as a buffer in case the other is laid off. However, because
most household costs (rent/mortgage, bills) require both incomes, the fix is
only temporary. In a sense, insecurity is doubled in dual-earner households,
as there is no homemaker who can enter the market if the breadwinner
falters.
Single mothers and their children are especially vulnerable in the era of
employment precariousness. While the economic situation of single mothers
has always been tenuous in the United States, their situation has worsened

Gender and Work

7

in recent years because of the erosion of the social safety net, and in particular diminishing welfare benefits. To receive public assistance today, poor
mothers must participate in paid work or job training (to enhance their “employability”). But the jobs available to them pay very low wages. In fact,
many of these “workfare” jobs are exempt from the requirement that they pay
the federal minimum wage. Moreover, as hourly workers, they are expected
to be available at any time—to work late at short notice or to work nonstandard hours. Low-wage employers are allowed to expand and contract
working hours depending on customer traffic. (US workers have a right to
minimum wages, but not minimum hours.) Single mothers unable to cope
with erratic schedules are consequently forced to forfeit their meager welfare
benefits (Collins & Mayer, 2010).
The incompatibility between the demands of unpaid domestic care
work and precarious paid work is provoking a crisis of social reproduction. Social reproduction refers to the labor necessary to keep households
functioning—the work required to raise children, care for the sick and
elderly, and tend to the upkeep of house and home. In the “golden age,”
this reproductive labor was performed by married women who were
supported by the “family wage” their husbands received. This bargain
was largely limited to white families; racial/ethnic minority families were
excluded, forcing married women into low-wage jobs to make ends meet.
Today, all families are left on their own to survive. In this era of precarious
employment, maintaining a livelihood is increasingly incompatible with
raising children. As a result of this tension, two societal-level consequences
are likely: (i) increasing poverty and income inequality and (ii) declining
fertility (Esping-Andersen, 2009). Both are occurring in the United States.
The increasing income gap is well known here; less apparent is the declining fertility rate because it has been obscured by immigration patterns.
Discounting the births to first-generation immigrants, the US fertility rate
would fall further below replacement level and look similar to rates in
Europe, which average about 1.6 births per woman.
CONTEMPORARY RESPONSES TO PRECARIOUS WORK
The increase in precariousness has not been a rallying point for US workers.
The “Occupy” movement, for example, targeted increasing income inequality but not the problems of job insecurity and declining job quality. In Europe,
by contrast, there is considerable talk of the growing “precariat” (Standing
2010), an eclectic class of workers who are disgruntled by the rise of insecurity in the labor market. Their activism has spurred a variety of responses to
precariousness. Here we review their implications for gender inequality.

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

In some cases, the rise of precariousness has stirred a nostalgic longing for
a return to the standard employment contract. Because this would entail a
return to the traditional gender division of labor, some feminists have been
wary of this particular response. In Italy, for example, young feminists argue
that precariousness might not be all bad. They disavow the “stability” of their
mothers’ generation, wanting nothing of the stresses of “balancing” paid
work and unpaid domestic work. In their view, temporary work contracts
are not problematic per se; low pay at work and the continued exploitation
of women’s unpaid labor in the home are the focus of their organizing efforts
(Fantone, 2007).
Some have argued that the standard employment contract is no longer
feasible precisely because it relies on the unpaid domestic labor of women.
Unlike the economy of the 1950s, the economy today depends on women’s
participation in the paid labor force. Moreover, some argue that the “home”
can no longer provide its traditional function of offering respite and regeneration to workers due to the “economization” of society. Lisa Adkins (2012,
pp. 622–623) explains that economization is “the folding of the economy into
society,” a process occurring as “productive and value-creating activities
[move] away from the formal workplace” and become dispersed “across
the social body.” This process is well under way, as technology is making
workers available to their employers 24/7, domestic work is becoming
thoroughly commodified, and the unemployed are busily enhancing their
employability. In this context—where we work even when we are not
working—the standard employment contract is hopelessly anachronistic.
Two forward-looking alternatives to the current precariousness are
“flexicurity” and “beyond employment.” Flexicurity is a labor policy first
introduced in Denmark that provides both flexibility for employers (allowing them to hire and fire workers as needed) and security for workers (in the
form of generous benefits and opportunities for retraining during periods
of unemployment). Flexicurity is a “win-win” proposition, according to
Kalleberg (2011, p. 183), because it addresses the needs of both employers
and workers in the context of competitive global capitalism. However,
the flexicurity model does not address gender inequality. It assumes that
the work of social reproduction will be carried out either by paid workers
outside the home (e.g., day care employees) or unpaid caregivers in the
home who rely on an employed partner to support them (e.g., stay-at-home
mothers). Just as in the standard employment contract, in the flexicurity
approach, the individual’s economic well-being depends on his or her labor
force participation. Those who are not in the labor force receive no benefits
even if they are engaged in the important work of social reproduction. Thus,
this approach does not address gender inequality stemming from the double
burden of women’s work.

Gender and Work

9

Although not a part of the “flexicurity” approach, some scholars advocate
for increased workplace flexibility to facilitate the combining of women’s
domestic and paid work. Policies such as part-time schedules, telecommuting, and flextime, it is argued, can enable women (and ideally, men as well)
to maintain their labor force participation while also performing domestic
work. Ironically, these forms of flexibility already characterize many precarious low-wage jobs, albeit under the control of employers and not workers.
In other words, low-wage employers get to determine the time and place of
work without regard for workers’ needs (schedules are flexible for employers, not employees). But advocates maintain that instituting flexible work
policies in professional careers can help women to “balance” their work and
family responsibilities (Correll et al., 2014).
There are a number of problems with this approach. First, research suggests that women’s careers suffer if they take advantage of these policies
(Glass, 2004). Second, women may be especially reluctant to ask for or take
advantage of these policies in an era of job precariousness, fearing that to
do so will jeopardize their employment. Third, it is unlikely that, if implemented, these policies would be under the control of workers. A recent study
of telecommuting, for example, confirms that employers control the conditions of telecommuting and are its primary beneficiaries (Noonan & Glass,
2012). Finally, these policies do not actually lessen women’s total amount of
labor; they merely shift the distribution of women’s time from fewer paid
hours to more unpaid hours of work. Thus, it is unlikely that institutionalizing increased workplace flexibility will mitigate gender inequality.
A more radical solution to precariousness is the “beyond employment”
approach, which seeks to uncouple employment status and social well-being
(Vosko, 2010). This approach originated from a group of experts convened by
the European Commission. It is based on the idea that it is in society’s best
interest to enable individuals to move in and out of the labor force at different points in their lives, depending on their caregiving responsibilities and
their personal needs for care and training. But instead of workers bearing
the risks and costs of fulfilling these needs, the state and employers should
take on these costs. In this model, economic well-being is not tied to market activity, but to valued contributions to society, including raising children.
A worker who drops out of the labor force to raise children is treated no
differently than a worker who is laid off or otherwise experiences discontinuities in employment due to precariousness: All workers who are involved in
socially necessary labor would be guaranteed income replacement. This “beyond employment” model aims to break down the breadwinner–homemaker
division by imagining a “universal caregiver” norm, under which a more
equitable distribution of unpaid work is prescribed and “all jobs are designed

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EMERGING TRENDS IN THE SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

on the assumption that workers are caregivers, shortening hours of work for
pay across-the-board” (Vosko, 2010, p. 222).
The “beyond employment” model has flaws. Unless it includes support
for publicly funded child care, it may not empower women in the market.
Instead, the model could encourage women to take on (state-subsidized)
caregiver roles while men continue to engage in paid work with some
support in-between precarious jobs. Moreover, the implementation of
shorter maximum work hours, which is a key to this approach, may not
be enforceable given the ubiquity of communications technologies that
expand the working day. Although not perfect, this “beyond employment”
approach nevertheless offers a vision of gender equality, making it unique
among the proposed alternatives to the current state of precariousness.
KEY ISSUES FOR FUTURE RESEARCH ON PRECARIOUSNESS
AND GENDER INEQUALITY
Scholars examining poverty have long studied precariousness, especially in
communities of color. Now that precariousness has spread throughout the
economy, it has become a new focus of research in the sociology of work.
Scholars are just beginning to study the implications of precariousness for
gender inequality. The literature we have reviewed has many gaps that call
out for additional research.
First, we need better measures of precariousness. As we have discussed, the
quantitative data are indicating a convergence of men’s and women’s experiences, but these numbers are contested. It may be the case that the degree
of precariousness in women’s jobs is underestimated because of the ways
that the information is gathered and analyzed. As suggested earlier, women
may claim to be “opting out” in response to the threat of layoffs. Moreover,
they may call their part-time work “voluntary” because their domestic duties
are onerous (researchers typically include only the “involuntary” part-time
workers in their measures of precariousness). More research is needed to
uncover the conditions under which women’s “voluntary” choices are made.
Researchers should not assume that because women make the choice to opt
out or work part-time that they are not impacted by precariousness.
Second, we need more research on how gender inequality shapes the
process of finding job opportunities in the new economy. Under the regime
of precariousness, people obtain jobs through networks, unpaid internships, and temporary employment services. Men and women may face
different challenges navigating these new pathways to work (Williams,
Muller, & Kilanski, 2012). The need for self-“branding” and self-promotion
in order to secure work may also be experienced differently by men and
women. For example, it may not be feasible for women to assimilate the

Gender and Work

11

neoliberal ideology in the same ways it is embraced by men (Lane, 2011).
Because this ideology is based on the assumption that workers are free to
move, change jobs, and be available at any time to their employers, it is
likely to be incompatible with the experiences of women with caregiving
responsibilities.
Third, more information is needed about precarious work in the informal economy. The research we have reviewed is all based on changing
employment conditions in the formal sector. But one of the most precarious
forms of employment is day-labor. Day-laborers are employed in a variety
of industries, including construction, agriculture, domestic work, and sex
work. Some workers are forced into these jobs because the state excludes
them from formal sector jobs on the basis of their immigration status or
criminal records. Others have no other options for work because employers
discriminate against them, for example, on the basis of race or gender
presentation. Because they work “off the books,” these day-laborers do not
appear in the quantitative data used to measure and analyze precariousness.
Because racial/ethnic minorities are overrepresented among day-laborers,
scholars can overlook the ways that the experience of precariousness is not
only gendered but racialized. We need more studies exploring the ways that
precarious conditions in these jobs impact men and women differently.
Finally, more research is needed on alternatives to the standard employment contract. The problems with precarious work that US workers are
facing are being addressed by different welfare states. Comparative and
transnational research on the experiences of workers under different policy
regimes in Europe and elsewhere could help guide US labor market policy
and worker activism.
Periods of economic crises can elicit nostalgic yearning for an idealized
“golden” past, but they also can be opportunities to rewrite the gender contract and imagine a future of gender equality. As we hope to have demonstrated, women’s interests must be part of any discussion of the future of
precarious work.
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Collins, J. L., & Mayer, V. (2010). Both hands tied: Welfare reform and the race to the bottom
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CHRISTINE L. WILLIAMS SHORT BIOGRAPHY
Christine L. Williams is professor and chair of sociology at the University
of Texas at Austin, where she teaches courses in gender, sexuality, labor and
labor movements, and qualitative research methods. She has written extensively on gender, race, and class inequality in a variety of workplace settings.
http://www.utexas.edu/cola/depts/sociology/faculty/clwillia

Gender and Work

13

MEGAN TOBIAS NEELY SHORT BIOGRAPHY
Megan Tobias Neely is a graduate student in the sociology department at
the University of Texas at Austin. Her research interests are in gender, race,
and class inequality in the workplace. She is currently working on her dissertation research on gender, organizations, and work in the finance industry.
http://www.utexas.edu/cola/depts/sociology/graduate/gradstudents/
profile.php?id=mtn497
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