Occupational segregation remains huge

I have compiled a table that takes the 357 occupations reported on by the Bureau of Labor Statistics for 2002, and orders them by the percentage of workers who are women, with the mostly female jobs at the beginning and the mostly male jobs at the end. Half of all women workers are in the first 71 occupations, which employ only 7 percent of the men. Half of the male workers are employed in the last 154 occupations in the table, which employ only 8 percent of the women workers.

Only 60 occupations out of the 357, those with 35-55 percent women (occupations 113-172) are relatively well integrated. They employ only 19 percent of the full-time workers of each sex. In 1984, 18 percent of the women and 15 percent of the men worked in the 57 occupations integrated to the same extent. Again, change has been minor.

For women and men to have the same distribution among occupations, about 30 percent of full-time women workers would have to change their occupations. Nearly 18 million women workers in occupations that are now disproportionately female would have to move into occupations that are now disproportionately male, and the same number of men would have to move into occupations now disproportionately female. The massive changes–36 million people taking up a different occupation–that would be required to equalize by gender the occupational distribution of the American labor force testifies to the extent of the current segregation in today’s labor market.

Actually, the situation is even worse, because workers in many occupations that have both sexes are segregated in their workplace. Witness waiters–most restaurants have either only men or only women.