Haya Stier

Women's Part-Time Employment and Gender Inequality in the Family

This article examines the effects of full- and part-time employment of women on various aspects of a households arrangements. It argues that only full-time employment represents a significant transformation in womens roles, thus providing the bargaining resources that allow them to affect the households arrangements. The authors see part-time involvement in market work as a way to maintain, rather than change, the traditional division of labor. Based on data collected in the fall of 1994 from a representative sample of the Israeli Jewish population, the authors find that although full-time employment contributes to gender equality within the household, part-time employment does not. Husbands of fully employed wives are more likely to participate in housework chores that are female-dominated, and full-time employed women are more likely than part-time employed or housewives to take part in the households financial and expenditure responsibilities. Part-time workers gain no advantage over housewives within their families.

Family work and women: the labor supply of Hispanic immigrant wives.

The article focuses on the economic circumstances and the family arrangements that govern the labor supply of Hispanic immigrant wives in the United States. We use a two-stage estimation procedure and a specification that models individual and familial factors that influence the labor supply of all women and those unique to immigrants. The analysis, based on a sample of Hispanic immigrant wives obtained from the 1980 U.S. Census, examines immigrant wives of Mexican, Puerto Rican and Other Hispanic origin and compares their labor supply with that of their native-born counterparts and U.S.- born white wives. Results indicate that the labor force behavior of Hispanic immigrant wives is highly responsive to their earning potential and, unlike that of U.S.-born white wives, is less constrained by their familial role as mothers.

Generating Labor Market Inequality: Employment Opportunities and the Accumulation of Disadvantage

We analyze the Urban Poverty and Family Life Survey of Chicago to illustrate race and ethnic differentials in the accumulation of labor market experience over the life course of inner city men and women. We find that relative to parents nationally, inner city mothers and fathers experience greater employment instability and accumulate large work experience deficits through their adult life course. Multivariate analyses based on complete labor force histories reveal that cumulative work experience and education significantly influences labor market success based on the odds of being in the labor force in any given year and the duration of job spells. Despite higher employment returns to work experience among minority compared to non-minority men, the poor average labor market standing of inner city minority parents partly reflects the experience deficits accumulated over their life course, particularly for Black and Puerto Rican men, and Hispanic women.

Finding an Adequate Job: Employment and Income of Recent Immigrants to Israel

Summary The study examines the early market experience of recent immigrants to Israel from the former Soviet Union (FSU) and their mobility patterns a few years after migration. The Labour Utilization Framework, proposed by Clogg and Sullivan (1983), was analysed to identify the employment difficulties immigrants experienced upon arrival, their short-term mobility in the labour market, and the income consequences of their disadvantaged position in the market. Using a panel study of immigrants who arrived in Israel during 1990, we found that although most of them found employment, only a minority did not experience employment hardships. Four years after their arrival, most immigrants were still employed in occupations for which they were over-qualified, and only a small portion of the group managed to find adequate employment. Women had more severe employment hardships and a lower rate of mobility into the better positions. For men and women alike, almost any deviation from a stable adequate employment entailed wage penalties.

Occupational segregation and gender inequality in job quality: a multi-level approach

Gender differences in perceived quality of employment (achievement, content, job insecurity, time autonomy and physical and emotional conditions) are examined. The study asks whether women’s occupations provide better conditions in areas that facilitate their dual role in society, as a trade-off for low monetary rewards. Specifically, it examines the association of women’s concentration in broader occupational categories, embedded in particular national contexts, with gender differences in job quality. Utilizing the 2005 ISSP modules on work orientation shows that women lag behind men on most dimensions of job quality, countering the hypothesis that women’s occupations compensate for their low wages and limited opportunities for promotion by providing better employment conditions. However, as women’s relative share in occupations grows the gender gap narrows in most job quality dimensions. The implications of these results are discussed.

Gender Inequality in Job Authority A Cross‐National Comparison of 26 Countries

This article argues that cross‐national diversity in women’s concentration in the public sector explains a substantial part of the cross‐national variation in the gender gap in job authority. Using data on individuals in 26 countries represented in the 2005 International Social Survey Program module on Work Orientation (supplemented by societal‐level information), this study supports this argument. The authors find that in countries with high levels of women’s concentration in the public sector, the gender gap in job authority is wider than in countries with lower levels of public sector feminization. The implications of these results are discussed in the context of state interventions in gender inequalities.

Who Benefits the Most? The Unequal Allocation of Transfers in the Israeli Welfare State *

Objective. This article critically examines contradictions within the Israeli welfare system, and asks how welfare transfers affect poverty for different social groups. Methods. Using data from Israel’s 1996 Income Survey conducted by the Central Bureau of Statistics, the analysis focuses on households with working-age heads, and compares poverty rates, before and after transfers among three groups: (1) recent immigrants; (2) Arabs; and (3) ultra-orthodox Jews (Haredim), distinguishing between couple- and female-headed households. Results. The results show that social welfare policy is more effective in aiding recent immigrants, who are entitled to special benefits, than aiding Arabs. The findings also show that transfers have a stronger effect in reducing poverty among female-headed families than among couple-headed families, thus reducing the gap between these two types of households. Conclusions. Israeli welfare policy reduces poverty, but this effect differs substantially by social group. While formally Israel is considered a universalistic welfare state, for historical and ideological reasons certain social groups, such as Jewish immigrants, have been favored and granted extra benefits, while others, such as Arabs, were neglected.

Immigration, State Support, and the Economic Well-Being of the Elderly in Israel

The economic well-being of the elderly largely reflects their cumulative achievements in the labor market and the success of welfare policy in reducing income gaps and inequality. This article focuses on the effect of immigration, especially its timing along the life course, on economic well-being later in life. Using data from a nationally representative survey of the elderly population in Israel, we found that immigrants entering Israel at a young age were able not only to accumulate sufficient labor force experience but also to secure the types of employment that grant high levels of benefits. Thus, they could achieve economic independence by old age. The findings underscore the role of the state in compensating those who immigrated at older ages for their inability to accumulate market resources by raising them above the poverty line.

Does Women's Employment Reduce Poverty? Evidence from Israel

This article focuses on two dimensions of the effect of womens employment on poverty. On the micro level, it examines the effects of womens employment on the odds of their household being poor, and, on the macro level, it examines the effects of womens employment on poverty rates in society. Analysing Israels 1996 Income Survey, our findings confirm the general argument that womens employment is negatively related to poverty, in both female- and couple-headed households. The findings show that poverty levels are substantially lower in households in which women participate in the labour market, either on a full-time or on a part-time basis, than in households in which the woman is not economically active. At the macro level, our simulations demonstrate that increasing womens employment, even to a part-time level, would reduce poverty in both couple- and female-headed households, and would reduce the economic disparities between these two types of households. Our findings also suggest that while universal employment of female heads of household has an unequivocal equalizing effect on poverty rates, universal employment of women in couple-headed households increases the poverty rate. These findings reveal the different selection processes of women in female- and couple-headed households into paid employment.

Spouses or babies? Race, poverty and pathways to family formation in urban America

Abstract This article analyses the Urban Poverty and Family Life Survey of Chicago and an urban subsample of the National Survey of Families and Households to examine race and ethnic variation in the occurrence and consequences of birth versus marriage pathways to family formation. Results based on multiple‐decrement life table analysis and multi‐variate life table regression analysis reveal strong race and poverty effects on pathways to family formation, but Hispanic origin does not systematically influence the odds that women will enter family life via marriage versus birth. We show stronger race effects on pathways to family formation for the Chicago sample owing to the much higher incidence of teen parenting among black inner‐city residents. Results also suggest lasting economic consequences of non‐marital fertility, irrespective of whether women eventually marry or divorce subsequent to a premarital birth.