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Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

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Re: Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

#151

I've said this before, but technology progress is the reason women now work outside the home. Not societal progress. Tasks that took all day in the 1900s - 1930s are now completely outdated or take minutes instead of hours. A housewife today would be bored out of her mind relative to how much work a 1900s era housewife had to do. Making 3 meals from near-scratch for 6+ people every day, raising 6-10 children so they…

Your argument would be much stronger with data. I wouldn't be surprised if the truth is somewhere in the middle and I certainly wouldn't discount the impact of the Vietnam War, feminism, social services, heck even consumerism, etc. on the tendency of people to work or stay at home.

And you're totally right that homemaker/stay-at-home-parent should be represented in the workforce... developing software is cake compared to that workload.

Re: Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

#152

I've said this before, but technology progress is the reason women now work outside the home. Not societal progress. Tasks that took all day in the 1900s - 1930s are now completely outdated or take minutes instead of hours. A housewife today would be bored out of her mind relative to how much work a 1900s era housewife had to do. Making 3 meals from near-scratch for 6+ people every day, raising 6-10 children so they…

The work seems to expand to fill the time. You'll notice people struggle to raise their 2-3 kids, when people previously had over a dozen. They're now putting in more effort per-child. Having cleaning be easier similarly seems to raise cleaning standards.

One important difference is that drastically fewer of the children die before adulthood.

Re: Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

#154
post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not as strongly, but there is demand for male nurses - they need stronger people to help move people around, and men are stronger. (biological facts, etc)

But does the people-mover have to be a nurse ? Can't you just hire a cheap, uneducated muscle-man to move your people?

"people movers" made me laugh.

You could, but might face liability. Also, perhaps not a full time job but also not easy to schedule. So you'd be paying someone to sit around 90% of the time.

Re: Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

#155

I've said this before, but technology progress is the reason women now work outside the home. Not societal progress. Tasks that took all day in the 1900s - 1930s are now completely outdated or take minutes instead of hours. A housewife today would be bored out of her mind relative to how much work a 1900s era housewife had to do. Making 3 meals from near-scratch for 6+ people every day, raising 6-10 children so they…

With you up to the very last sentence. Labor force is an economic term with a specific meaning. It is not the same as saying that someone is not working for someone to not be in the "labor force". Since there's an economic purpose to the definition as-is, I don't see how you can possibly claim it is condescending without misrepresenting what the term actually means.

Re: Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

#156

I've said this before, but technology progress is the reason women now work outside the home. Not societal progress. Tasks that took all day in the 1900s - 1930s are now completely outdated or take minutes instead of hours. A housewife today would be bored out of her mind relative to how much work a 1900s era housewife had to do. Making 3 meals from near-scratch for 6+ people every day, raising 6-10 children so they…

I thought mainstream American History usually says that women mostly entered the workforce due to a shortage of men during World War 2?

Re: Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

#157
post #70

So according to that, software developers are around 20% female. That seems high to me, from my own experiences. Even still, with all the "let's get more women in tech" stuff I read, are there initiatives to get women in the other jobs even further to the left on that graph? (largely physical labor jobs)

I'm sure that will work swimmingly. The "Everybody Can Code" craze led to a ton of bootcamps and now they are falling one by one. Turns out not everybody can code.

Re: Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

#158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just a friendly reminder as I noticed you're new - patronising, nonproductive comments like this don't go over as well here as they do on reddit.

I've been lurking here since it started. It's not patronizing - it's pointing out a basic statistical fact. Has the bar on HN truly fallen so low that pointing out that anecdote != data is now considered rude?

"Has the bar on HN truly fallen so low that pointing out that anecdote != data is now considered rude?"

yes... yes it has :)

Re: Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

#159
post #89
post #70

So according to that, software developers are around 20% female. That seems high to me, from my own experiences. Even still, with all the "let's get more women in tech" stuff I read, are there initiatives to get women in the other jobs even further to the left on that graph? (largely physical labor jobs)

> are there initiatives No, people tend to be only interested in professions that are "hip" enough. Nobody is going to glamorize plumbers (even though they certainly should!).

Things got out of control with the advent of the social network movie. All of a sudden the general population thought coders were snorting cocaine off strippers in Palo Alto while wiping their bums with hundred dollar bills. Now everybody wants to join the party.

Re: Most Female and Male Occupations Since 1950

#160

I've said this before, but technology progress is the reason women now work outside the home. Not societal progress. Tasks that took all day in the 1900s - 1930s are now completely outdated or take minutes instead of hours. A housewife today would be bored out of her mind relative to how much work a 1900s era housewife had to do. Making 3 meals from near-scratch for 6+ people every day, raising 6-10 children so they…

The work seems to expand to fill the time. You'll notice people struggle to raise their 2-3 kids, when people previously had over a dozen. They're now putting in more effort per-child. Having cleaning be easier similarly seems to raise cleaning standards.

Children also weren't expected to continuously be monitored by adults before. They left the house and hung out with siblings or neighborhood kids until it was time to eat.
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