What changed? Women Participation in the Workforce
During 1904 when a young lady named Katharine McCormick graduated from MIT university with a Biology degree only the second female to do so, women had very fewer chances to attend school let alone college, voting rights were still not prevalent and use of birth control was illegal. This woman later at the age of seventy became the primary financier for the two researchers Min Chang and Gregory Pincus, who were working in the production of an oral form of birth control pill called “Enovid”, they faced many obstacles from the authorities and society as at that time US people used to frown upon the idea of birth control though majorly the population of the disagreed individual were males but it was difficult for even female to accept it as it was in many cases unreligious. So their initial funding for producing the pills was pulled off and no investor was interested in an idea which will not fetch returns as the use and sale of birth control was illegal through the States. Though things changed and people started to accept the new product and in the 1960s the use of the pill was allowed in twenty-six states, with restrictions of only married women can consume them. The positive effects of the pill were noticed quickly and the demand to make it legal in other states increased and soon it was not only legal throughout the US but also the condition of only married women were also lifted. So the rise of women participation in professional jobs such as medicine and law increased dramatically, according to a study done by C.Goldin, L.F.Katz and M.J.Bailey provided insights into the reason for the increase in women’s participation and credited the birth control pill it. With the introduction of female birth control, women got the chance to choose the time for childbearing allowing her to either continue working or take other responsibility thus increase the workforce period for females which was in the yesteryears prioritized for childbirth.
The graph above shows the rise in women participation in the recent years with the advent of the birth control pill which also helped in lowering the ever-booming population of nations especially in South-Asia which has more than 17% of world’s population. The increase in awareness and campaign of the rights and requirements of women made it possible for them to get included in the workforce, as the need for both genders are different so to cater to this gap many laws and workplace behavioural change have been observed in the last few decades, flexible and increased maternal leave being one of them.
Workforce participation in India
The strength of a nation is measured by the amount of labour force it has which can toil for the economic cycle to move faster than the past years, many countries have capitalised their huge population to drive their cycle by including the youth in jobs through skill development of institutional training. India has the most number of IT professional working for the nation and also in aboard giving the nation an edge in its soft power which makes it an important ally to have for many bigger developed ones. Now the labour force participation is usually measured by the term Labour Force Participation Rate which is the measure of the labour force, including the employed and unemployed ones, by the adult population of that nation,
The trend of women participation in the labour force has increased throughout the world with the advent of the increase in the service sector and manufacturing sector becoming more efficient due to use of modern technology has made it possible for women to enter work and excel in them. Though in developing nations like India participation are recorded low due various factors ranging from the availability of jobs, low access to higher education, especially in small towns and rural areas where the stigma of women education is still prevalent and opportunity of growth, is low in these areas, other reason being the lack of toilets which makes their movement difficult, low usage and stigma associated with sanitary pads and contraceptives lowers their working hours and span working age.
The lack of gender-sensitive infrastructure in urban areas is not a new topic There have also been several attempts at sanitation engineering — the Swachh Bharat Mission — Gramin (SBM-G), the rural wing under the Ministry of Sanitation claimed to have made 89 per cent of rural India Open Defecation Free (ODF). There is, however, a major difference in the emphasis on rural sanitation versus urban sanitation. Though rural sanitation is a priority due to lack of hygiene education, the availability of toilets and cultural-traditional norms, urban sanitation is a specific kind of problem due to hygiene concerns linked to toilet maintenance and sewage disposal.
Footnotes
Missing women participation, Urbanomics
Toilets needed to bridge gender disparity in India’s urban workforce, Observer Research Foundation
Labour force participation, Marginal Revolution University
