Summary for 11/2

The four readings for class all discussed the costs related to being a woman. In the workplace, women are not afforded the same rights as men. More specifically, women with children are often discriminated against and many other women are forced to turn to sexually demoralizing jobs to make ends meet. “The Mommy Tax” by Crittenden explores the myth that women are equal in the job force. One anti-feminist group claimed that women made ninety cents to every man’s dollar and Crittenden challenges the claim stating it does not include women with children. Women with children make a measly seventy cents to every man’s dollar. Furthermore, they are often forced to take unpaid maternity leave and work schedules that pull them away from their children for fear of consequences. Crittendon includes several anecdotes to prove her point, including her own story about the loss of a calculated $600,000. Rather than leaving the job force altogether, many women opt to work part time. Crittendon goes on to show that part time mothers make disproportionately less money for their hours; many claim the workload is actually the same as a full time job and they are just making less money. I felt that Crittendon made some very good points in her article I was just a little disturbed when she wrote that “It seems like a high price to pay for doing the right thing” (89). I think it is judgemental of Crittendon to write that the “right thing” is for women to quit their jobs to raise their children. Many women successfully raise happy and healthy children while working part time or full time jobs. Crittendon should have also considered the prospect of the father staying home to raise the children. I think it is only a very small minority of women that can afford to raise their children in Crittenden’s “right way.”
“Maid to Order” by Ehrenreich explores the growing trend of housemaids. She explains how paying someone seems to justify demeaning them and the majority of these workers are women forced into these careers for financial reasons, “But in a society in which 40 percent of the wealth is owned by 1 percent of households while the bottom 20 percent reports negative assets, the degradation of others is readily purchased,” (59). This type of job creates a unique predicament for the working class. Pay for some companies is strictly controlled based on attendance, a problem for women that may have children, unreliable transportation, etc. The nature of the work is also troubling for one’s health. Women especially strain their knees and backs while working and the job is not meant to ever be held long term. Beyond damaging the workers, this growing trend is teaching children “that some people are less worthy than others, that the employer has ‘something better’ to do with her time.” I think this is an interesting point to make because all of the people I know that have cleaning maids take little responsibility for their belongings. They do not pick up after themselves because they assume that someone will do it for them. Cleaning is seen as a waste of time and left for someone that has nothing better to do.
The remaining two pieces appear in Listen Up. The first, “Reality Check” explores one woman’s struggle to avoid poverty while also avoiding demeaning jobs. As a college student, the author was trying her best to make it by and was almost forced into becoming a go-go dancer. I think this can be tied back to “Maid to Order” because women can be forced into a variety of jobs that are demeaning to women, if not explicitly sexual. Being forced into cleaning up after a man can be understood as equally demeaning as being sexually objectified by a man. The other article “Knowledge is Power” explores one woman’s challenges on welfare. She writes how no one chooses to be on welfare or wants to be on welfare. I must disagree with this point. While I feel that the majority of women on welfare do not want to be on welfare, there are a lot of people (including women) that do choose to remain on welfare. My father works as a welfare fraud investigator and he examines these cases daily. There are many women that lie in order to gain more money from the government; many say that they are raising their children alone, are paying for daycare, and job searching while they are not. Many young women are also encouraged to get pregnant at a young age in order to receive welfare. For most people I would agree that being on welfare is unfortunate and stigmatized, but I think the people abusing the system need to be reprimanded before the system can begin to offer more services.