The roots of today's “women's jobs” and “men's jobs”: Using the index of dissimilarity to measure occupational segregation by gender

Abstract

Looked at broadly, occupational distributions by sex in the United States have changed remarkably little since 1900; accordingly, researchers have found a slow rate of decline in the index of dissimilarity (a measure of occupational segregation by gender), estimates of which have so far been confined to the 20th century. This paper analyzes trends in the index over the latter part of the 19th century. The results indicate that during this period, industrialization and the associated changes in the nature of the business enterprise resulted in a rapid declinne in occupational segregation by gender, as measured by the index. This decline occurs earliest in cities experiencing early industrialization. Index estimates are presented for the United States and for selected midwestern cities, and changes in the index are decomposed into occupational mix effects and sex composition effects. Occupation-specific index changes are used to identify which occupations influenced changes in the overall index. The results indicate that the dynamic occupational shifts of the 19th century set the stage for the “men's jobs” and “women's jobs” that have been so persistently stable in the 20th century.