Women and Employment

Abstract

This paper is based on the results of the research project “The Status of Women and Men in the Czech Republic” from 1998. It was inspired by the need to obtain information on the circumstances of enforcement of EU legislation on equal opportunities in the Czech Republic in connection with the Czech Republic’s application for EU membership. The project aimed to investigate the public perception and consciousness of equal opportunities. Therefore, it deals with the main issues of the EU directives and recommendations: equal pay, equal treatment as regards access to employment, promotion and vocational training, legal knowledge concerning employment and so on. Reconciling family and working life is the crucial problem in the Czech Republic, as in other countries. It can be understood as a result of both modernisation and the special national situation that has resulted from the social and economic transition. The paper compares conditions of women’s employment with their professional expectations and satisfaction. It shows the social determination of these, and some stereotypes in understanding men’s and women’s roles. These facts influence women’s position on the labour market in various aspects. Czech Sociological Review, 1999, Vol. 7 (No. 2: 179-194) Employment is not merely a source of income and of personal satisfaction, but also an important field for the formation of social relations between individuals and one of the factors that determines social status [Cermakova 1995: 12, Sanderova 1998: 149]. Work has a somewhat different role in the life of women than of men, even if the basic selfrealisation (to use one’s abilities, to be independent, to share in a joint project, to do something useful) and instrumental (to earn a living or to be financially independent) needs are more or less common to both genders. The basic difference lies in the place that a person’s profession and work holds both in determining the social status of women in comparison with men, and in confrontation with women’s other roles and aspiration, primarily in the family. The need (or necessity) of women to be part of the public work sphere is shown by their continuing high level of employment in the post-communist countries and the rising level of female employment in western countries.1 The actual situation may differ according to its origins and development (e.g. the structure of female employment, the specific level of employment by age and marital status, the percentage of women in part-time employment). In balancing their maternal (partnership) and professional roles, a steadily increasing number of women (mostly young and well-qualified) are placing greater importance on the latter. This can be explained by the rising professional ambitions of in*) Direct all correspondence to: PhDr. Věra Kuchařova, CSc., Research Institute of Labour and Social Affairs, Palackeho naměsti 4, 128 01 Praha 2, fax +420 2 24 97 28 73, e-mail rilsa@ecn.cz 1) In EU countries women made up 30% of the workforce in 1970, and 45% in 1995. In the Czech Republic in mid-1998 the figure was 43% [Equal... 1996, Zaměstnanost... 1998]. The comparison between the EU and the Czech Republic is complicated by the fact that the majority of women here work full-time. Czech Sociological Review, VII, (2/1999) 180 creasingly educated women, by the increased demands on professions and by uncertainty on the job market, but also by the lack of support in combining the two. It is virtually impossible to eliminate the conflict between these two aspects since it is an expression both of subjective needs and of socio-culturally and economically determined conditions. For this reason, this conflict cannot be entirely disregarded in any study of female unemployment. In this article I would like to sketch out the broad outlines of the question of female employment, principally on the basis of data collected in the survey The Position of Men and Women (MW98) [Kuchařova and Zamykalova 1998]2 in comparison with other research and statistical surveys. The main questions in considering the selected aspects of women’s employment were as follows: What role does work have in women’s lives in terms of their position and of combining work and family? How do the approaches of men and women to their professional position differ and what effect does this have? Have women gained or lost in the field of work and employment during the process of transformation? To what extent is there (conscious) discrimination against women in the work arena? Employment and Education The high level of women’s employment common in previous decades has been carried over into the 1990s. While it fell slightly after 1989, it has remained around 52% in recent years. The fall can be attributed to a lower level of employment of young women due to prolonged maternity leave, and among older women to the fall in the number of people continuing to work after retirement age, and also to the higher level of unemployment in general. There has also been a slight rise in the number of housewives. In general, however, the main features of the relatively high female employment are still present: women’s high level of qualifications and their interest in working, employers’ willingness to employ female employees, the fact that most families need two (or more) incomes to survive, women’s social-psychological motivation to work (as a means of gaining independence and social contacts, as well as of maintaining their social status) [c.f. Cermakova 1995]. The situation is slowly changing. The need imposed by the labour market for constantly improving qualifications is more difficult for women, as is the demand for increased mobility. Interrupting a career to look after children is becoming an even greater obstacle for women on the labour market. Employment opportunities for women are becoming increasingly dependent on their age, family situation and education3 and on the relation between these. On the other hand, women in the Czech Republic have be2) The survey Postaveni žen a mužů v CR 1998 [The Position of Women and Men in the Czech Republic 1998] (referred to in the text as MW98) was carried out using a quota sample of 1000 respondents – 602 women and 398 men aged 20-60, distributed by regions. It was decided not to have the sample representative by sex (since we wanted a larger sample of women so as to be able to classify them more precisely) and the young and middle-aged groups were slightly larger (as we presumed that they would be more sensitive and concerned about “the woman question”), which influenced the distribution by education. The influence of these indicators was of course determined for each subject or indicator studied [Postaveni... 1998]. 3) The women’s employment rate by level of education is 22.9% for those with elementary education, 68.4% for those with technical qualifications, 70.7% for high school graduates and 78.5% for university graduates. Věra Kuchařova: Women and Employment 181 come more evident in highly qualified professions and in private business. The socioeconomic position of women in this country has however retained its specific structure both in comparison with that of men, and in comparison with EU countries (Table 1). It can be summed up as a high level of employment, with over 90% of women employed, and a high proportion of women (over 80%) working full time. In addition, 46% of working women have completed secondary school, technical or general, although only 10% have a university degree. Table 1. The Socio-Economic Status of Men and Women in the Czech Republic 1998 and EU 1996 (in %) Czech Republic European Union