12: Women in Non-Traditional Jobs: Part I

Occupational segregation exists because society classifies professions by gender. This gender socialization leads members of different genders to gravitate towards certain types of professions. For example, women are socialized for working in more emotional fields like teaching, while men are socialized for working in more powerful fields like police work.

This is also tied in with the differing expectations for women and men as far as family roles go. While women can hold traditional nine-to-five jobs, they are generally not associated with jobs that have odd hours or require more masculine traits like police officer, security guard or prison worker. Odd hours equate to the inability to be what society sees as a proper mother, but they also are responsible for a the wage gap that is evident between male and female positions. The ability to work longer, later hours means more money, promotions, and a higher profile job within a field. The notion of a balancing act that women must take on in order to succeed at work and still remain a good mother is not reflected to the same dramatic extent on the male side.

Women gain multiple advantages when breaking into traditionally male-dominated careers. Because these fields are not largely populated by women there are sometimes fiscal benefits to pursing these fields. For instance, to study particular topics in a college setting, women can receive scholarships merely for their gender. This can assist in diversifying a workplace, or school environment, and encourage equality between males and females where it was previously not present. Additionally, pursuing a non-traditional field can be empowering.

Men absolutely benefit from women entering male-dominated professions because it forces them to take in new ideas, see jobs from a different perspective and, possibly, discover a newfound respect for women.