Woman Between Islam and Western Society
3. Western Woman
~ 131 ~
support and service jobs, the male-female wage gap
narrowed in recent years as much because of
declines in men’s salaries (due to recession
condition) as of increases in women’s wages. As of
1989, women were still more likely than men to be
working at minimum wage jobs. Female workers
were less likely than males to have employer or
union-sponsored pension plans in 1987 (but
between 1980 and 1987 the proportion of male
workers with pension plans dropped by 6
percentage points).
In spite of the fact that nearly half the American
work force consists of women, neither
maternity/paternity leave nor childcare support
was by any means the norm in American firms,
even in 1989. At that time, no more than 3
percent of medium and large size firms, on
average, provided paid maternity leave, and this
went down to 2 percent for small firms (with less
than 100 employees). In 1988, more than 60
percent of American children under age 18 had
working mothers, but as far as childcare
assistance is concerned, no more than 10 percent
of firms of all sizes provided any real benefits or
