Title: Women in the workforce - Wikipedia
Headings: Women in the workforce
Women in the workforce
Contents
Areas of study
Women and economic development
Paid employment globally
Workforce participation by sector
Sectoral distribution of employed persons, by sector and sex (2004 through 2007)
Occupational dissimilarity index
Laws protecting women's rights as workers
Women in workforce leadership
Barriers to equal participation
Access to education and training
Access to capital
Discrimination within occupations
Actions and inactions of women themselves
Sex segregation
Gender inequality by social class
Effects on the middle and upper classes
Effects on the working class
Impact issues of female participation in the workforce
Fertility
History
19th century
20th century
The Quiet Revolution
Occupational safety and health
See also
Women's participation in different occupations
References
Bibliography
Professional areas
External links

Content: Percent of women in the workforce among all women aged 20–64 years in the European Union in 2011
Proportion of women in senior and middle management positions (2017)
Since the industrial revolution, participation of women in the workforce outside of the home has increased in industrialized nations, with particularly large growth seen in the 20th century. Largely seen as a boon for industrial society, women in the workforce contribute to a higher national economic output as measure in GDP as well as decreasing labor costs by increasing the labor supply in a society. Women's lack of access to higher education had effectively excluded them from the practice of well-paid and high status occupations. Entry of women into the higher professions, like law and medicine, was delayed in most countries due to women being denied entry to universities and qualification for degrees. For example, Cambridge University only fully validated degrees for women late in 1947, and even then only after much opposition and acrimonious debate. Women were largely limited to low-paid and poor status occupations for most of the 19th and 20th centuries, or earned less pay than men for doing the same work. However, through the 20th century, the labor market shifted. Office work that does not require heavy labor expanded, and women increasingly acquired the higher education that led to better-compensated, longer-term careers rather than lower-skilled, shorter-term jobs. The increasing rates of women contributing in the work force has led to a more equal disbursement of hours worked across the regions of the world. However, in western European countries the nature of women's employment participation remains markedly different from that of men.