After the Japanese launched their surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, there was a surge of men who wanted to enlist in the army. With the army force growing, the factory work force diminished and the government needed to make sure that they could supply the army with the tools they needed to win the war. At first, the government was reluctant to ask housewives to leave their positions and fill in the gap, as there was fear of women becoming independent. However, the government became so desperate for work that they set out to create propaganda to convince women to start working in factories.
With pieces of propaganda, the most well known being Rosie the Riveter, thousands women joined the workforce to help the war effort. The aircraft industry was around 65% female as opposed to the 1% before the war. By 1945, nearly one in every four married women worked outside the house. Rosie became the symbol of working women in America and helped with women getting to work.
However, women who did get to work didn’t receive the same rights. Their pay was often much less than their male counterparts. Even though women were dominant in certain areas, they would often be earning less than half of what men earned at the time. While women were urged to come to the workforce, they weren’t met with equal treatment one might expect they should get.
When the war ended, the conditions for women didn’t improve at all. Instead, women were asked to leave the workforce to make space for the men who were returning from war who were looking for jobs. It was an interesting turning point, earlier, employers were desperate to get women to work, and now they were demanding they leave. In 1948, the amount of women in the workforce dropped from 37% to around 32%. Many women weren’t happy with giving up their jobs, which helped spark the movement for women’s rights in the workplace. Rosie the Riveter played an essential role during the war, but was discarded after to make place for the soldiers of the war.
Sources: https://humx.org/rosie-the-riveter-985cd6e3a8a4
https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/rosie-the-riveter
https://www.history.com/news/women-workforce-wwii-training-video-1940s
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your post, and I liked how you included numerical statistics. I find it very interesting how women’s societal standing often improves during times of war. I would also like to point out that women not only filled jobs vacated by men who left to fight in the war but also enlisted in the army. Nearly 350,000 American women served in uniform, volunteering for the newly formed Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps, the Navy Women’s Reserve, the Marine Corps Women’s Reserve, the Coast Guard Women’s Reserve, the Women Airforce Service Pilots, the Army Nurses Corps, and the Navy Nurse Corps.
ReplyDeleteSource: https://www.nationalww2museum.org/students-teachers/student-resources/research-starters/women-wwii