But the child-care argument and others like it, such as the misplaced belief that women are less likely than men to aspire to top jobs, don’t entirely account for the gender gap, says Christine Silva, director of research at Catalyst, a Toronto-based non-profit aimed at the advancement of women in business. For a study released last month, Catalyst surveyed high-potential earners (graduates from M.B.A. programs at top-ranking schools from 1996 to 2007) and analyzed the workplace experience of those who aspired to management positions and didn’t have children. What they found: “The gap between women and men starts at the very first job after they graduate,” she says. “Even after we’ve taken into account their prior work experience, the industry they work in, women start at lower levels.” Not only did the salary men pulled in from their first jobs outpace women by $4,600, but men were also more likely to start at more senior positions—a trend, says Silva, that “just intensifies over time.”
Despite the fact that men have so far suffered the lion’s share of job losses in the downturn, women have not been immune. According to the Canadian Auto Workers union, between 2008 and 2009 the number of women in the country’s manufacturing sector dropped by 9.1 per cent—on par with men. But unlike men in blue-collar sectors, many of whom are retraining to apply their skills to a trade or primary industry, such as mining or oil, women are often unable to land another relatively high-paying job, says Calhoun. “When they’re laid off, they’re just right back where they normally are, which is working at retail or in Tim Hortons.” (There may be more trouble ahead for women too, as governments eye cuts to the public sector—an area that is dominated by women.)
Since Hetal Parikh lost her job at Polywheels Manufacturing after the Oakville, Ont., factory shut its doors in 2008, she says finding something else has been tough. Though there have been postings for other manual labour jobs, the 37-year-old mother of two says they often require heavy lifting. “For a man, it’s easy. For a woman, it’s hard,” she says, adding that the pay doesn’t approach what she was making at Polywheels. (Parikh’s husband works in IT, but she says his salary alone is not enough to support the family.) Instead, she’s awaiting approval for government funding to retrain as a medical lab technician. While she expects to earn less than in the auto sector, the medical field, she says, is never in recession.
But as much as the so-called man-cession has highlighted some of the challenges facing women, it has also presented an opportunity for change. According to Konrad, who has been studying gender in the workplace for more than two decades, survey results have shown that each year incoming male university freshmen score lower on sexist attitudes and higher on gender egalitarianism. “These trends in attitude map onto the changes in behaviour. Men are doing more [of the household duties],” she says. But men are not the only ones experiencing an attitude adjustment. “As women, we can be a little hard on our men,” she says. “We’re happy to be equal partners, but to be the one who is taking care of them financially? We don’t have a template for that.” She would know. Ten years ago, her husband decided to leave his job to become a full-time volunteer activist. “That was a real shock to me,” she says. Though it took time to adapt, he now does the bulk of the cooking and cleaning, and, she says, “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
As the economy recovers, so too will jobs. Government has moved to try to breathe life into the manufacturing sector, wiping out tariffs on imported equipment and implementing a $47.2-billion stimulus plan. But the old, postwar dynamic of the middle-class family—one supported by a single paycheque, a woman who raises children at home—is gone for good. At the Rae residence, Brian says that watching his wife become the primary breadwinner, however temporarily, has been tough. “It does make you feel like you’re not doing your job,” he says. But as he progresses through the home renovation course, he says his outlook has improved. “You [feel like you] can revisit the workforce, and try again.” And in the meantime, he says, the cooking and cleaning has served to keep him busy: “I’m still doing something—it’s just stuff around the home instead of outside the home.”
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