A flexible work environment seems to be more conducive to female employment. Some would argue that almost everyone prefers it, but when it comes to whether or not it’s a deal breaker, women (as a group) are either less willing or less able to sacrifice time with their family for the sake of a job. <\/p>\n
This is nothing new. Men have historically been more willing to work long hours, take more business trips, etc., than women. Women value other things more. (Again, I’m speaking in terms of groups not individuals.) <\/p>\n
Therefore, the “back to the office” push (from some companies) and efforts to crack down on “flexible” work schedules is in tension with an effort to get (or keep) more women on the payroll. <\/p>\n
Is this … <\/p>\n
(1) The patriarchy trying to push women out of the office? or, <\/p>\n
(2) Employers who genuinely believe the old, “in the office 9-5” (or so) model is better, and care about the increased productivity more than they care about women’s employment? <\/p>\n
Let’s assume it’s #2. <\/p>\n
Some people will take issue with the assumption that the old (in the office) model is better. They’ll say flexible work environments are more efficient. <\/p>\n
This is one of those areas where you can find studies to justify your preference. I eye them all with suspicion because of how closely they’re tied to this socially charged issue. <\/p>\n
In my mind it’s more interesting to look at the issue this way. <\/p>\n
Some would argue that even if<\/i> the “in the office for long hours” assumption is true, it’s socially damaging because it limits female participation in the workforce, and that’s more important than the productivity question. <\/p>\n
You could make an analogy to child labor. Even if<\/i> companies are more productive and efficient if they can hire children, it’s simply not something we want in our culture. IOW, the bottom line is not always the final arbiter of these questions. <\/p>\n
And that’s<\/i> where the problem lies. <\/p>\n
Is the goal of getting more women to participate in the workforce (1) a goal everyone shares, and (2) worth the hit to productivity? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A flexible work environment seems to be more conducive to female employment. Some would argue that almost everyone prefers it, but when it comes to whether or not it’s a deal breaker, women (as a group) are either less willing or less able to sacrifice time with their family for the sake of a job. … Continue reading “Is “back to the office” just a tool of the patriarchy?”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3534","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3534","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3534"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3534\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3536,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3534\/revisions\/3536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3534"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3534"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crowhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3534"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}