Marriage bars were a practice adopted from the late 19th century to the 1960s restricting married women from employment in many professions, especially teaching and clerical jobs. Marriage bars did not affect employment in lower paid jobs, and therefore lowered incentives for women to acquire education. (Borjas)
“The ‘marriage bar’ was not discrimination against women. It can never be understood in that way. It was discrimination in favour of the full set of family households: a fairer redistribution amongst them. It was the progressive policy of its times—an important measure to promote social justice in a period when real want was a problem for millions. Times changed and it was abolished, but that it persisted up until recent decades was partly or even largely at the behest of women—to prioritise women in the work place who had no support from a husband. As soon as it ceased to be of use to women, it was rescinded.” (Moxon)
Famous quotes containing the words marriage and/or bars:
“What exacerbates the strain in the working class is the absence of money to pay for services they need, economic insecurity, poor daycare, and lack of dignity and boredom in each partner’s job. What exacerbates it in upper-middle class is the instability of paid help and the enormous demands of the career system in which both partners become willing believers. But the tug between traditional and egalitarian models of marriage runs from top to bottom of the class ladder.”
—Arlie Hochschild (20th century)
“Howling and roaring
Toe’osh scattered white people
out of bars all over Wisconsin.”
—Leslie Marmon Silko (b. 1948)