Closing the Gap

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Synthesizing research on the relationship between job opportunities and gender norms.

The Economic principle I’m exploring is “Institutions are rules of the game that influence choices”. My overall research question to help me explore the principle is - How do gender norms affect job opportunities/choices?

To begin, according to the article published on Monda.eu titled “Gender Roles, Norms, and Stereotypes”, a gender norm is defined as a consistent pattern of what individuals do based on the gender they identify themselves as. As for gender roles, that can be defined as “a set of expectations associated with the perception of masculinity and femininity”. These terms are very similar because they deal with personal opinions shaped by a community. Both gender norms and gender roles limit the opportunities of my men and women, especially in the job industry. In the past, women have been given the role of staying at home to clean and help with the children. This limited their opportunities because many people, mainly men, believed that they were unable to hold high office positions. Although this idea is mainly behind us, women are still ostracized in the workforce because of the current “norms”.

Second, the article published in AAUW titled “ The Simple Truth about Pay Gap ” shows the difference in pay between men and women. It states that women are usually paid “80 percent of what men were paid”. This means there is a 20% gap between men and women salaries on average. In Illinois, women earn “79.3 cents for every dollar a man makes” which is a 20.7% gap.

Finally, as a result of time, it is statistically shown that the line between masculine jobs and feminine jobs is becoming blurred. Chad Brooks, author of “Gender Roles? Traditional ‘Gendered’ Jobs are Being Flipped” , claims that “23% of jobs traditionally held by men are now held by female workers” and “27% of female dominated occupations… are held by male workers”. These statistics show that adults going into the workforce are ignoring the gender association of each job. Changing role can take time, but it is heading in the right direction.