Volume 20, Number 2 (Spring) 1985
Beller, Andrea H. 1985. "Changes in the Sex Composition of U.S. Occupations." Journal of Human Resources 20(2):235-250.
Analysis of occupational data from the 1960 and 1970 Censuses and the Current Population Surveys for 1971 to 1981 reveals that occupational segregation of men and women declined more rapidly in the U.S. during the decade of the seventies than during the sixties. Most of the decline was due to changes in the sex composition of traditionally male occupations. Women's rate of entry into nontraditional occupations increased, with the most dramatic changes occurring among managerial occupations. In contrast, the heavily male crafts occupations and the heavily female clerical occupations remained as segregated during the 1970s as they were during the 1960s.
The author is Assistant Professor. Department of Family and Consumer
Economics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
This research was supported in part by funds from the
University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign Research Board. Initial support came
from the Employment and Training Administration, U.S. Department of Labor, under
Grant No. 91-25-78-04, and by funds granted to the Mary Ingraham Bunting
Institute of Radcliffe College by the Lilly Endowment. Francine Blau, Victor
Fuchs, and an anonymous referee provided helpful comments on an earlier draft,
and John Boyd, Juan Moran, and David Robinson pro- vided fine computational
assistance at various stages of the research. The views expressed in this paper
are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the official position
of any sponsoring agency.
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