Woman Between Islam and Western Society
3. Western Woman
~ 132 ~
support for childcare. However, 35-45 percent of
all firms did provide flexible schedules and
flexible leave times for parents with young
children.
“Flexitime” notwithstanding, in 1987 6.2 million
working mothers in America paid for childcare.
Of these 750,000 had incomes at or below the
poverty line, and for them childcare expenses ate
up 20 percent of their income. Though mothers
with children under age 21 and no father present
are entitled to government child support, often
they do not get it at all or do not get the full
amount.
Closely related to the issue of women’s
earnings and benef its in the fact that between
1970 and 1989 the number of women workers
of age 16 and above holding mult iple jobs
increased by almost 400 percent — from
636,000 to more than 3 million. Women who
worked more than one job in 1989 were more
likely than men to be doing so because the
additional earnings were necessary to
meet
regular household expenses.
