American families are experiencing the effects of the "Great Recession." Most of the job losses are accruing to men, so families may find it strategic for wives to enter the labor force, or increase their work hours. We consider this possibility using the May 2008 and 2009 Current Population Survey, and compare findings to May 2004 and 2005 data,…

Reports on a study indicating that most able-bodied heads of poor households demonstrate labor force attachment, but their employment tends to be intermittent, low-paying, or both. (Author/CH)

Burden of unemployment shifted from male household heads to female and teenage family members during the 1962-71 period. (MF)

Special Labor Force Report on marital and family characteristics shows increase in number of families with more than one worker. (Editor)

According to data from the 1985 Agricultural Work Force Survey, over 13.5 million of the 17.6 million agricultural work force household members (77 percent) lived in households headed by a farm worker. Some farm workers worked on the farm as their primary job, whereas others primarily worked off the farm. Farm work was an occasional form of…

This Special Labor Force Report of March 1973, shows a continued decline in labor force participation rates of married men and an increase in rates of married women with young children. It also explores the trends of husbands' and wives' labor force participation, as well as labor force activity of other groups, such as women heads of families and…

The Special Labor Force Report shows a substantial rise in the labor force participation rates of married women and single and divorced persons. Also explored is the downward trend of married men (55 years old or over) as members of the labor force. This decline was due mainly to early retirements and to some extent to a rising incidence of…

Examined effects of household structure on labor force status of female heads of families with minor children using the March 1985 Current Population Survey. Results suggest that models of labor force behavior are misspecified if female heads of families are not analyzed separately by race and marital status. (Author/ABL)

This information sheet presents 20 facts on women workers in 1989: (1) 56 million women 16 years of age and over are working or looking for work; (2) 69 percent of all women 18 to 64 years of age are in the civilian labor force; (3) most women workers are employed full time; (4) the average women worker spends 29.3 years of her life in the labor…

Women have increasingly become more involved in the workforce following World War II. Paid employment of women has shifted from primarily traditional female-oriented jobs to more non-traditional, and previously male-oriented careers. Women's participation in the workforce has lead to the study of career aspirations of women. Career aspirations are…

Special Labor Force Report shows mothers of almost 26 million children under age 18 were in the labor force in March 1972. (Editor)

Boston-area families described the ambivalence of male responses to pressures of increased participation in homemaking. Because of different social support networks, men obtain little support and help in performing housework. Men perceiving paid employment as their primary contribution hesitate to acknowledge responsibility for homemaking…

The jobless rate among all household heads reached 6 percent in April 1975, double the average rate over the 1963-74 period (2.8 percent), and half again as high as the previous peak (4 percent) recorded during the first half of 1963. The number of unemployed household heads increased from 1.4 to 3.2 million from October 1973 to April 1975, from…

The specific purpose of this study was to evaluate the role of several decades of high out-migration in the socioeconomic adjustment of households left behind in the Arkansas Ozarks and to identify meaningful labor force and social adjustments to poverty area industrialization. The study involved 12 counties in north-central Arkansas. The research…

Decisions by individual women to seek employment outside the home are usually based on economic reasons. Most women in the labor force work because their families need the money they can earn--some work to raise family living standards above the low-income or poverty level; others, to help meet rising costs of food and education for their…