Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: I conduct the first test using longitudinal data of three key theories of the division of housework in couple households: economic exchange, gender display, and time availability. This approach yields a more realistic, dynamic picture of the division of housework in couple households than we have from existing cross-sectional research. My sample consists of men and women who remain in coresidential unions with the same partners in the first two waves of the National Survey of Families and Households (NSFH). I determine the effects of changes in relative earnings and employment status on men’s housework hours. I also analyze the impact of changes in household composition. My results indicate weak support for the economic exchange hypothesis that individuals use earnings to reduce their housework. I do not find evidence to support the gender display hypothesis, namely that individuals use housework to compensate for gender-atypical relative earnings. The strongest effects on men’s housework hours come from changes in their own and their partners’ employment statuses, in the directions implied by the time availability hypothesis. Men increase their housework hours when they experience reductions in employment, and when their partners augment their labor force involvement. I find no difference between cohabiting and married men in their housework adjustments to changes in the independent variables.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Since the late 1980s, the world’s workforce has become increasingly feminized. Liberalization policies have increased competitive pressures, which, in turn, have pushed firms to decrease labor costs by lowering wages, benefits, and job guarantees. Scholars have shown that these trends have pushed women to enter the workforce, as men refuse to work in such conditions (Balakrishnan 2001; Beneria and Roldan 1987; Mehra and Gammage 1999; Standing 1999). However, few have examined how these dynamics work within a household. Based on both quantitative and qualitative data from India, this study uses structural equation models and regression analysis to (1) create a measure of working conditions, and (2) show that women’s working conditions are significantly affected by their marital status and their husband’s working conditions. In particular, women whose husbands are unemployed have the worst levels of working conditions. Therefore, in cases where household incomes may not have plummeted drastically, even in the face of rapid economic changes, the quality of life and burdens placed on women have substantially increased. The quantitative data used in this study draws from India’s National Sample Survey (1997-2002), and the qualitative data is based on 150 individual interviews with women and men workers in three cities of India.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: The gender rhetoric of the 2002 German federal election campaign focused on the term family. Our study investigates the sources and the causes for this reduction of women's policy to family policy in the election campaign. We interviewed the main campaign strategists of the major parties, analyzed programmatic statements and campaigns as well as the national press in the months heading up to the elections. The main finding is that the refamiliarization of gender debates was primarily due to masculinist frames within the campaign headquarters. Campaign strategists for the most part exhibited little differentiated knowledge regarding gender issues. Moreover, their need for polarization and dramatization of the campaign formed a mixture of women's and policy issues that addressed women only as mothers - while f.e. leaving fathers completely out of the discourse frames. During the campaign, equal opportunity issues were not only dethematized but also delegitimized. The German media supported this delegitimization by way of indexing issues according to weight they had acquired in the campaigns.

Publication Type: POSTER
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: Current youth want to have it all – a career and a family. Yet, when the time comes, young women tend to choose one over the other. The study’s goal was to offer a possible explanation for the discrepancies between intentions and behavior. Findings suggest that the husband’s flexibility is a crucial factor.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Review Method: Peer Reviewed
Abstract: In light of changing gender norms and increased female labor force participation, this paper examines the factors associated with couples' income in marital households. It then considers how the correlates of the relative income contributions of husbands and wives have changed since 1970. Preliminary results suggest that spousal characteristics, own human capital investments, and family demographics are associated with relative income. Our initial, bivariate look at relative income suggests there are stark differences between couples who contribute about equally and couples in which wives or husbands contribute the bulk of income.