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1
Technological Charlge and
Women Workers In He Office
The employment effects of technological change have again become an issue
of public concern. In particular, questions have been raised about future em-
ployment opportunities for women workers because many of the new develop-
ments especially in telecommunications and microprocessing have already
dramatically altered work involving information processing, an area of work
dominated by women. Recent research suggests that automation in the clerical
sector is altering the numbers and types of jobs available, the nature of jobs and
their geographic location, working conditions, and career opportunities. A ma-
jor quantitative study recently predicted that the number of clerical jobs in the
economy will decline by 1995, not only relatively but also absolutely (Leontief
and Duchin, 1984), although this prediction is controversial. Earlier waves of
automation in office work also raised fears of unemployment, yet clerical, pro-
fessional, technical, and managerial employees have increased their share of
the labor force in every decade since at least 1940 (Hunt and Hunt, 1985a).
Is the present situation different? For the past several decades, as employ-
ment in the U. S. economy has continued to shift from agriculture and manufac-
turing to services, the latter sector has absorbed large numbers of new workers,
particularly women and young people. Technological developments have con-
tributed to the introduction of new products and services that provide new kinds
of jobs. Sectoral shifts in demand, accompanied by economic growth, histori-
cally have produced better opportunities and wages for some workers. Two
striking examples for women workers are the nineteenth-century shift of young
women workers from agriculture to manufacturing and the recent shift of black
women from agriculture and domestic service to clerical positions. Economy-
wide, technological change is credited with contributing to productivity
1
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2
COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
growth, standard of living increases, and generally higher wages. In the last
decade, service industries have adopted new strategies, reorganized work, and
introduced new machines to increase productivity. If productivity gains in-
crease substantially in the service sector, will it continue to generate enough
jobs to absorb all the workers seeking employment? What kinds of jobs will
they be? Will they offer safe and healthy working conditions, job stability, good
wages, and opportunities for advancement? Both future levels of employment
and the "quality" of work are closely related to the introduction and use of new
technologies.
This report identifies and analyzes the effects of technological change on
both the quantity and quality of women's paid employment. It focuses particu-
larly on innovations in information processing and telecommunications and
their applications in offices past, present, and likely future. The interest of the
Panel on Technology and Women's Employment is in determining whether
women may be differentially affected by these innovations relative to men and,
if so, how; to what extent women of different ages, educational backgrounds,
and race and ethnic groups may be affected differently; and what factors may be
shaping these effects.
The "machine" aspects of technological change in office automation have
captured the public imagination, but they are only part of the picture. They have
drawn the attention of scholars, workers, employers, and policy makers to a
much more pervasive set of changes in the organization of work, its geographic
location, and the characteristics of workers. Hence, when the report examines
employment effects resulting from technological change in microprocessing
and telecommunications (information technology or "telematics"), it includes
the wider changes in work organization and composition of the labor force as
well as the more immediate effects of the new machines themselves.
In seeking to determine the effects of technological change on women's paid
employment, the report focuses on new technologies in clerical occupations,
both because the technical developments in these occupations are dramatic and
appear to have been widely implemented and because so many women work in
these jobs. Clerical occupations are a diverse group, ranging from the "typical"
office ones of secretaries, typists, and file clerks to bill collectors, interviewers,
telephone operators, dispatchers, mail carriers, insurance adjusters, bank tell-
ers, and proofreaders. Table 1-1 displays the number of workers in clerical
There are many definitions of clerical occupations; conceptually, clerical work is not a clear
category, and the boundaries are difficult to delineate. This report generally uses the 1980 census
classification of "administrative support workers" as its definition of clerical workers, but notes
significant changes that have occurred in the government classifications. The most typical clerical
occupations, those that would be regarded as clerical workers in any classification system—
secretaries, stenographers, typists, file clerks, bookkeepers, accounting and financial clerks, and
general of flee clerks—account for 8.9 million, or more than half of the 16.8 million workers identi-
fied as administrative support workers in the 1980 census.
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
3
occupations in the 1980 census (16.9 million), with the number and percent
female in each. The five clerical occupations with the largest number of work-
ers were secretaries (3.9 million), bookkeepers and accounting clerks (1.8 mil-
lion), general office clerks (1.6 million), typists (0.7 million), and general
office supervisors (0.6 million). For women clerical workers, the first four
largest occupations were the same, but general office supervisors (0.4 million)
were in seventh place, below receptionists (0.5 million) and bank tellers (0.5
million). (Cashiers, another large occupation- 1.7 million and about 85 per-
cent female often thought of as clerical workers, were reclassified in the 1980
census as sales workers.) The 13.0 million women clerical workers represented
more than three-fourths of all clerical workers and more than one-third of all
employed women workers in 1980.
In reviewing data and research on employment trends and on the develop-
ment and implementation of new information technologies in several clerical
occupations and sectors, the report seeks to identify both the positive and nega-
tive aspects of this wave of technological change and to reduce the uncertainty
surrounding estimates of the likely size, incidence, nature, and timing of the
effects. The report also considers how employers' decisions to adopt and imple-
ment new technologies and workers' participation in these processes can affect
outcomes. Finally, the panel identifies and recommends private and public
policies that can alleviate negative effects, promote improvements in women's
employment opportunities, and produce a more humane work environment for
all.
The remainder of this chapter first defines technological change and de-
scribes some recent and anticipated changes in information technologies. It
then discusses the measurement and characteristics of technological change and
explores in a schematic way the economic and social context of technological
change and the employment effects that can result. It next describes women's
employment situations and explains why the panel expects differential effects
from technological change for women workers.
Chapter 2 discusses selected examples of technological change in communi-
cations and information processing and considers especially its effects on wom-
en's employment levels, absolutely and relative to men, and on the content and
quality of work. The effects discussed include indirect, unforeseen, and uneven
effects. These topics are examined in several critical types of women's employ-
ment: communications work and clerical work in information and data process-
ing, with a comparative look at retailing and nursing. The chapter also con-
siders briefly how workers have responded to technological change in these
cases and how managers' and workers' interests have differed and coincided.
Chapter 3 analyzes the current and future effects of technological change on
the levels of employment and the structure of occupations and considers
changes in both the supply and demand of workers. It reviews projections made
by the Bureau of Labor Statistics and presents the panel's estimates of the most
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COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
TABLE 1-1 Employment of Administrative Support Occupations in 1980
Total Percent Female
Occupation Employment Female Employment
Administrative support occupations 16,851,398 77.1 12,997,076
Supervisors, administrative support occupations 1,056,710 47.1 497,668
Supervisors, general office 631,337 56.1 354,410
Supervisors, computer equipment operators 42,142 29.4 12,392
Supervisors, financial records processors 157,409 49.0 77,172
Chief communications operators 66,765 34.3 22,898
Supervisors, distribution, scheduling, and
adjustment clerks 159,057 19.4 30,796
Computer equipment operators 408,475 59.0 241,155
Computer operators 384,392 58.9 226,354
Peripheral equipment operators 24,083 61.5 14,801
Secretaries, stenographers, and typists 4,656,955 98.3 4,579,938
Secretaries 3,870,582 98.8 3,823,248
Stenographers 85,785 90.7 77,841
Typists 700,588 96.9 678,849
Information clerks 894,178 85.4 763,561
Interviewers 134,002 78.0 104,582
Hotel clerks 61,217 68.2 41,756
Transportation ticket and reservation agents 99,449 57.5 57,161
Receptionists 516,498 95.8 494,800
Information clerks, n.e.c. 83,012 78.6 65,262
Nonfinancial records processing 965,107 77.2 745,372
Classified-ad clerks 13,552 77.6 10,521
Correspondence clerks 19,309 81.5 15,741
Order clerks 311,321 67.4 209,871
Personnel clerks 75,235 87.4 65,759
Libras clerks 140,731 81.2 114,294
File clerks 277,592 79.7 221,350
Records clerks 127,367 84.7 107,836
Financial records processing 2,254,084 88.4 1,991,619
Bookkeepers and accounting clerks 1,827,890 89.7 1,640,233
Payroll clerks 159,292 83.3 132,622
Billing clerks 129,380 88.9 115,020
Cost and rate clerks 85,855 68.4 58,731
Billing, posting, calculating machine operators 51,667 87.1 45,013
Duplicating, mail, office machine operators 58,671 65.6 38,462
Duplicating machine operators 18,822 61.0 11,484
Mail and paper handling machine operators 7,052 62.3 4,390
Office machine operators, n.e.c. 32,797 68.9 22,588
Communications equipment operators 308,690 89.5 276,148
Telephone operators 292,165 91.0 265,938
Telegraphers 7,604 35.7 2,711
Communications equipment operators, n.e.c. 8,921 84.1 7,499
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
TABLE 1 - l (Continued)
5
Total Percent Female
Occupation Employment Female Employment
Mail and message distribution clerks 773,826 29.6 229,096
Postal clerks 267,035 35.8 95,511
Mail cancers, postal service 256,593 12.9 33,179
Other mail clerks 167,973 47.3 79,425
Messengers 82,225 25.5 20,981
Material recording, scheduling, and distributing 1,662,256 34.4 571,300
Dispatchers 94,830 31.2 29,568
Production coordinators 254,625 44.2 112,539
Traffic, shipping, and receiving clerks 481,958 23.6 113,554
Stock and inventory clerks 570,906 34.7 198,345
Meter readers 41,407 10.2 4,239
Weighers, measurers, and checkers 72,040 36.6 26,348
Samplers 2,542 45.5 1,157
Expediters 106,146 53.9 57,242
Material recording, n.e.c. 37,802 74.9 28,308
Adjusters and investigators 515,666 62.3 321,234
Insurance adjusters, examiners, investigators 163,586 60.2 98,407
Noninsurance investigators and examiners 243,616 62.4 151,951
Eligibility clerks, social welfare 24,128 81.8 19,744
Bill and account collectors 84,336 60.6 51,132
Miscellaneous administrative support occupations 3,296,780 83.2 2,741,523
General office clerks 1,648,934 82.1 1,353,251
Bank tellers 494,851 91.2 451,465
Proofreaders 27,321 79.1 21,610
Data-ent~keyers 378,094 92.4 349,477
Statistical clerks 139,174 75.0 104,345
Teachers' aides 206,695 92.7 191,564
Administrative support, n.e.c. 401,711 67.2 269,811
NOTE: n.e.c., not elsewhere classified.
SOURCE: Data on total employment from Hunt and Hunt (1985a:Table 2.1(a)); data on female
employment and percent female from Hunt and Hunt (1985a:Table 2.4); based on 1980 decennial
census data.
plausible worst case. The chapter also examines recent and projected shifts in
the demand for various occupations.
Chapter 4 analyzes the current and likely future effects of technological
change on employment quality and examines how job content changes in terms
of autonomy, responsibility, and knowledge. The chapter considers workers'
attitudes and job satisfaction, computer-based monitoring and pacing, telecom-
muting, and other aspects of job quality. It also explores the roles of managers
and workers in implementing new technologies and improving employment
quality.
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COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
Chapter 5 identifies some remaining areas of uncertainty, particularly with
regard to the panel's analysis of likely future change. The panel offers recom-
mendations to facilitate the mutual adaptation of technology and employment.
The panel concludes that the problems posed by the new technologies (particu-
larly for women workers) are capable of solution (1) through public and private
policies that increase opportunities for women workers to benefit from
change by means of education, training, and equal employment opportu-
nity and that provide assistance to those who become unemployed as a result
of change; (2) through the development of models for collaborative decision
making and their dissemination; and (3) through research on the effects of
technology and alternative ways to implement it.
TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE
Much recent technological change involves the systematic use of new scien-
tific knowledge in the production of goods and services. Earlier technological
change, which could be called inventive technology, was episodic and unpre-
dictable; its experiential, noncumulative character limited its applications.
Starting around the turn of this century, however, scientific research began to
substitute for random inventions and to produce solutions to socially defined
problems, and methodical scientific research now feeds technology with poten-
tial solutions on a continuous, regular basis. This relatively recent approach has
become the dominant mechanism of technological change, although discontin-
uous invention by imaginative individuals has by no means disappeared: for
example, that quintessential twentieth-century invention, the Xerox photocopy
method, was developed in 1938 by a creative patent attorney working indepen-
dently with an unemployed physicist; they could not sell their idea to any large
office machine supplier (Washington Post, August 21, 1985:B1-B21.
Built on a scientific base in addition to inventors' efforts, applications have
become more flexible; contemporary technological change both provides more
choice and generates continuing change. Today, technological change is some-
thing humans decide to do, and it can be directed in ways to produce positive
results. Scientific knowledge and inventive technology make change feasible;
social decisions, shaped by cultural attitudes as well as economic consider-
ations, determine where change occurs and what is produced.
Technological change alters the goods and services that are produced or the
methods by which they are produced. It is presumed that such alterations in-
crease productivity or competitive advantage. These alterations produce in-
creased output with the same inputs (or reduce or make less costly the inputs
needed to produce the same output), improve the quality of the outputs, or
create entirely new products or services. Technological change is often con-
ceived simply as the application of innovation in science and engineering to
production for example, the development of rubber, the telephone, penicillin,
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
7
ceramics, or computers. However, it also encompasses new organization of
production or distribution processes the assembly line, typing pool, or self-
service. Innovation and the reorganization of production also occur amidst gen-
eral changes in the uses of capital and labor and the location of both these
factors. Technological change and its concomitants, by this very broad defini-
tion, have the potential to affect all areas of social life, including art and litera-
ture. This report confines its attention to technological change that occurs in the
workplace and has an impact on paid employment, particularly on women
workers in clerical jobs. Other non-workplace-based technological changes-
for example, birth control and household technologies have had enormous
effects on women's paid employment in this century, but they are not examined
here.
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGIES
The most important technological developments affecting women's work are
those involved in the miniaturization of computers and the dramatic improve-
ments in telecommunications. Both developments affect the speed and ease of
manipulating, analyzing, and communicating information, tasks in which the
vast majority of women workers are employed. With the advent of the micro-
processor, small computers with as much memory as the early large mainframe
computers (which in their earliest vacuum-tube design filled entire rooms) be-
came feasible. Sufficient circuits for their central processing units, including
work space and operating system, can be placed on one silicon chip as small as
one-quarter square inch. With the development of sophisticated software that
requires little expertise in computer languages, small computers have become
ubiquitous. They are incorporated in home appliances, automobiles, and hand-
held calculators, as well as in stand-alone word processors and home and per-
sonal computers. The miniaturization of processing is proceeding apace. The
number of components that can be placed on a silicon chip has doubled every 12
to 18 months for the past 20 years. Experts see the near-exponential growth in
chip capacity continuing; denser chips perform increasingly complex logical
tasks faster. The cost of chips has decreased a thousandfold in 20 years (Ross,
19851. Advances in telecommunications have also occurred rapidly. If devel-
opments in aircraft design had occurred on the same scale as those made in
chips, "planes carrying 500,000 passengers each would be flying between New
York and London for a fare of 25 cents" (Ross, 1985 :351.
Computers
Some observers of the very rapid increases in processing speed and memory
size of computers suggest that the cost of computing hardware will continue to
fall. They also expect a very rapid diffusion of computers even to small busi-
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COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
nesses, so that by 1990 perhaps one-half of all offices will have some form of
computer available foroff~ce tasks. They point to annual increases in sales of 13
to 16 percent and to increasing capital/labor ratios in much of the service sector:
in financial services, for example, capitalization is at $8,000 to $10,000 per
worker, compared with approximately $25,000 to $30,000 in manufacturing,
but the gap is closing (Office of Technology Assessment, 19851. Other observ-
ers point out hidden costs (such as software development, software mainte-
nance, system maintenance) and remaining technical difficulties (such as estab-
lishing local area networks that link personal computers to each other and to a
mainframe) and suggest that diffusion will be much slower. These observers
also point to very recent decreases in sales of new computer equipment and
consequent layoffs among vendors, which they take as an indication of sources
of resistance to computerization in the office (Hunt and Hunt, 1985a). Still
other observers point to established social arrangements in offices that may
make the full adoption of office automation less feasible (Murphree, 1985;
Iacono and Kling, 1986; see also Chapter 2 of this report). Finally, the rate of
adoption will of course depend on the capacities and prices of the equipment
offered, which will be affected by the rate of technical change within the com-
puter-manufacturing industry and in telecommunications. Recent develop-
ments in these areas are considered next.
Data-Entry Technologies A keyboard is currently the dominant mode of
data entry, but other methods are being developed. For example, an optical
character reader (OCR) is available in many workplaces for specific uses and
selected type styles. The OCR currently available is 40 to 50 times faster than
keyboard entry. Although OCR capacities are increasing quite rapidly, it will
probably be some time before handwriting can be interpreted reliably by ma-
chine. Speech recognition and voice-activated "typewriters" are another po-
tential input methodology, but technical development here is proceeding more
slowly; most machines are limited to selected speakers and small vocabularies.
Nevertheless, some experts expect that by the year 2000, 35 percent of data
entry will be by OCR or speech recognition.
Storage and Processing For microcomputers, magnetic discs are the domi-
nant form of storage, and their storage capacities have increased several times
since their first appearance. Optical discs, currently being developed, can store
up to 25 times more than magnetic discs at one-thirtieth the cost; 250,000 pages
can be stored on one optical disc (Office of Technology Assessment, 19851.
Improvements are also being made in image processing; the development of
software (because of increasing reliance on already-developed subroutines);
the creation of expert systems, such as medical diagnostic systems, which are
intended to simulate experts in analyzing information; and electronic mail,
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND wOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
9
including software for "automatic calendaring" the process of keeping track
of appointments and arranging mutually convenient meetings.
Output and Display Technologies Rapid change is occurring in improving
display capabilities: better-quality printers, such as the laser printer, the liquid
crystal screen, and more flexible and powerful plotters, all of which will be-
come available in multiple colors. Speech synthesis, a nonvisual output, is also
developing rapidly. It is already used in several large-scale applications, such
as in telephone number information services.
System Compatibility and Interconnection System interaction is clearly
crucial if services such as electronic mail are to become widely used and if
microcomputer users are to have access to a variety of information. It appears,
however, to be a very difficult area. Although a report by the Office of Technol-
ogy Assessment (1985) indicates that the use of local area networks (LANs) is
expanding rapidly, some businesses are currently having trouble connecting
personal computers and mainframes within their individual organizations; sub-
stantial programming is usually involved, which slows the process. This prob-
lem could be at least partially solved by standardization, which is not now
occurring. In the absence of significant standardization, peripheral conversion
equipment is being developed.
Telecommunications
Telecommunications has also improved dramatically in the past two decades
and is increasingly integral to computing capability. The recent report of the
Office of Technology Assessment (1985) suggests that computers and tele-
phones are becoming increasingly alike. The interrelation between communi-
cations and computing is easily seen: for example, a single large (but standard)
switch in the Atlantic Telephone & Telegraph system has 1.6 million lines of
programming (Ross, 1985~. The major components of telephony are a cus-
tomer terminal, transmission, switching, and signaling.
Over the years new functions and capabilities have been added to the tele-
phone handset, the most common customer terminal today; other types of ter-
minals in use include teletypewriters, data terminals, and computer terminals.
Each of these terminals can incorporate microprocessors, giving them "logic"
and "memory," making them "intelligent" and capable of more functions. The
handset now provides call waiting, call forwarding, three-way calling, and so
on, and sometimes serves as a terminal for data entry and information retrieval
(for example, at-home banking). An earlier technical advance was the ability to
transmit the digital information used by computers over the analog lines of the
telephone system with the use of the modem (named for its function, modula-
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COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
tor-demodulator). Increasingly, telephone services are installing digital lines,
which will speed transmission of data and video material as well as voice.
The technical problems in transmission involve distance and volume. Trans-
mission today uses copper wire, coaxial cable (concentric copper cables), radio
(including microwave and satellite), or optical fiber cable. A very large coaxial
cable can carry 132,000 simultaneous conversations. Optical fiber is small and
lightweight, with vein high capacity (approximately 1,400 simultaneous con-
versations on a single fiber), relatively immune to electrical interference and
resistant to signal loss, and may eventually replace all other cable. A trans-
oceanic optical fiber cable is being developed for use in the late 1980s. Optical
fiber cables transmit information in digital form, which is more flexible than
analog form, since voice, video, or data can be transmitted in digital form.
Telephone switching has undergone enormous technical change. Today's
automatic switching devices handle more than 600,000 calls per hour. Signal-
ing takes place over a parallel network that provides the means of signaling and
controlling transmission, switching, and customer terminals. The signaling
system allows long-distance calls to be switched completely from their origin to
their destination in less than two seconds.
Among the developments that are foreseen over the next decade in comput-
ing and telecommunications are improvements in the rapidity of computer re-
sponse, greater responsiveness to the user in the simultaneous accommodation
of several computer languages, increased use of telecommunications to connect
computers and to distribute data and computation where needed, development
of local area networks, increased ease of human communication with com-
puters through voice recognition and more natural computer languages, and
sophisticated and highly portable software (Bucy, 19851. All of these changes
have affected and will continue to affect information-processing jobs by de-
creasing the cost of that processing and increasing its ease. Coupled with in-
creased transportation capabilities, these innovations also increase the flexibil-
ity with which office work can be performed. For example, the increased
miniaturization and decreased cost of computers makes work at home on small
computers feasible. Large "back offices" in remote locations can serve the
national needs of a company with retail branches or executive offices located
elsewhere. And, within offices, innovations have contributed, and will con-
tinue to contribute, to reorganizing work and changing its nature.
SOCIAE CONTEXT OF TECHNOEOGICAE CHANGE
Technological change, narrowly defined as the progressive adoption of a
particularinnovation, generally proceeds unevenly; an innovation takes time to
diffuse throughout the economy until its use becomes the new norm. Histori-
cally, the time required from invention to first commercial application of an
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
11
innovation has usually ranged from 5 to 20 years, and the period from first use
to widespread use, from 1 to 15 years; diffusions of major innovations, such as
electricity, have taken up to 50 years (Katz and Lazarsfeld, 1955; Mansfield,
19661. Electronic computing has been used in offices since the late 1950s, when
large mainframe computers first became available. Operated by specialized
data-processing staffs and custom programmed for the particular applications
needed, they were first used to assist in large-scale and repetitive tasks: payroll,
statistical analysis of large data sets like the national census, and so on. Interac-
tive systems, like that for airline reservations, were developed in the 1960s.
Now microcomputers with direct telephone hookup promise a new office form:
the integrated workstation, where one person can quickly and simultaneously
have access to information from several data bases.
Although technological change may be readily conceptualized as the adop-
tion of particular innovations, it is in fact very difficult to measure technologi-
cal change embodied in innovations and to assign specific results to particular
innovations. Two examples- the assembly line and word-processing equip-
ment suggest some of the measurement problems. The assembly line, a major
technological innovation, contributed to reducing labor input per automobile
and to lower sales prices for automobiles. In the same period, personal incomes
increased, movies spread new tastes and behavior, and suburbanization created
housing spatially removed from central cities. The automobile became a mass-
consumption product leading to a substantial increase in output and employ-
ment in automobile manufacturing. The decline in labor input per automobile
resulted in an aggregate employment gain, but how much of the gain can be
directly attributed to the assembly line?
Word-processing equipment may well contribute to increases in the ease and
speed of word entry and to reductions in the cost per page entered, but it may
also contribute to increased or more consequential error because of the auto-
mated capacities, for example, a deleted page or a "lost" document (one that
was not properly stored electronically). Furthermore, as many people have
observed, word processors may lead to greater numbers of drafts of a given
manuscript and so to more time spent in word processing. Again, an innovation
that might be expected to save labor and lead to reductions in employment
might actually increase employment. And, as word processors give way to
personal computers and workstations, more far-reaching effects may occur: the
lines between secretarial and professional/managerial work may blur as secre-
taries increase their access and ability to manipulate information, allowing
them to generate analytic reports; the location of work may become more flexi-
ble with stand-alone equipment and telephone access to centralized data bases;
and a reduced need for paper record-keeping may alter work organization dra-
matically.
These examples illustrate the ways in which the uses and effects of technol-
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
OUTPUT AND EMPLOYMENT:
TRENDS AND INTERPRETATIONS
13
In the economy as a whole, both output and employment have grown sub-
stantially since World War II. Nonfarm employment grew nearly 70 percent
between 1948 and 1978, while output increased nearly 165 percent (Mark,
1979~. However, employment, output, and productivity growth have slowed
since 1974. Past experience has given rise to several contradictory interpreta-
tions of this slowdown. One is that "too much" technological change has
caused the decline of employment growth (Sadler, 1981; Noble, 1984~. Advo-
cates of this interpretation note that a long-term tendency for unemployment to
increase seems to be developing, despite productivity improvement in the re-
cent recovery. They fear that economic growth based on rapid technological
change may not encourage employment growth—that the widespread use of
microcomputers may contribute to the employment problem, not solve it. The
nature of the new computer-based technologies has also led to questions about
whether the educationally disadvantaged will become even more relatively dis-
advantaged if they do not have appropriate training.
A second interpretation holds that greater investments in technology are nec-
essary to enhance productivity and to increase output, to keep the United 'States
internationally competitive, and to maintain a healthy economy in which em-
ployment will grow (Schmitt, 1983; Adler, 1984b). Indeed, several U.S. indus-
tries, such as steel, textiles, and shoe manufacturing, that failed to innovate and
restructure have become less and less internationally competitive. Exponents of
this interpretation point to the increase in the number of persons employed,
including many women, in such industries as banking and insurance, which
have been technologically innovative industries. Although the rate of growth
has slowed in some occupations and a few have nearly disappeared, service
sector employment has grown overall because demand for its products and
services has burgeoned. New microprocessing and telecommunication technol-
ogy have both reduced costs of old services and permitted the introduction of
new products and services in banking, insurance, and other industries (Appel-
baum, 1984~; the innovations have thus contributed to increases in demand.
Because these changes also involve new forms of organization, recruitment,
and training, some of these observers predict that open opportunity and access
to training may lead to a more democratic workplace rather than to further
disadvantaging the disadvantaged.
A third, and the most futuristic, interpretation of the effect of technological
change on employment suggests that in the foreseeable future, productivity
may be so enhanced that employment may become a rarity for everyone. People
will need to learn how to use vastly increased leisure time well; new social
mechanisms, other than employment, will have to be developed to distribute
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COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
income (Leontief, 1983; Bell, 1984~. As these conflicting interpretations illus-
trate, new technology poses uncertainties, problems, and possibilities.
Output Measures
Most measures of technological change are economywide and indirect. The
most commonly used indicator of technological change is the increase in output
per hour of labor input, or labor productivity. What has been the change in gross
national product (GNP) relative to the increase in hours worked? The labor
productivity measure attributes all changes in output, including those caused by
increased input of capital, to increases in the productivity of labor. A more
accurate indicator of technological change, total productivity, relates output to
total inputs, or at least to both capital and labor. But measurement and interpre-
tation problems persist with both labor input and total input measures: for ex-
ample, both methods measure changes in quantity better than changes in qual-
ity. Furthermore, measures of the output of all services, but particularly of
government services, are based almost totally on inputs (see National Research
Council, 19791.
Total productivity measures, which estimate the average rate of technologi-
cal change at approximately 2 percent per year, attribute to technological
change all output growth other than that due to changes in the quantity of the
inputs. It is estimated that as much as 90 percent of the growth in output per
capita since 1900 has been due to technological change and macroeconomic
factors other then changes in the quantity of capital and labor (Mansfield, 1966;
Hunt and Hunt, 1985b). Foremost among these other factors associated with
greater output is improvement in the quality of labor, particularly through in-
creases in average educational attainment.
Other, somewhat more direct measures of technological change attempt to
measure scientific and technical effort: for example, changes in the amount of
money spent on research and development, in the number of patents issued, and
in the number and proportion of scientific and technical personnel. Case studies
of specific innovations in selected industries have also been carried out. They
are generally able to assess how rapidly a particular innovation was adopted
throughout an industry or several industries and how effective it was in improv-
ing productivity. Such direct measures, however, are difficult to interpret inde-
pendently of effects in the economy as a whole.
Employment Effects
Identifying and measuring the employment effects of technological change
are even more difficult than measuring the output effects of technological
change. The employment effects may not occur until long after the introduction
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
15
of an innovation; they may occur in entirely different firms, industries, or loca-
tions or entirely different occupations from those actually using the innovation;
or they may be entirely unanticipated. Furthermore, as with output changes,
employment effects are qualitative as well as quantitative, and qualitative
change is always much more difficult to measure. Finally, as noted, it is diff~-
cult to isolate the effects of technology from the effects of other economic and
social changes occurring simultaneously with the introduction of new technolo-
gies; this inseparability is the fundamental problem in the interpretation of em-
ployment effects.
Employment Levels In the production of a particular product or service, it is
axiomatic that if technological change increases the productivity of labor while
demand for output does not increase, employment must fall if not immedi-
ately, eventually; if not in the particular firm that innovates, in another that does
not; if not in the number of workers, in the number of hours worked; if not in
laying-off present workers, in failing to hire new workers. But productivity
growth can also increase demand for output by lowering its price, increasing its
quality, or creating new products that tap new demands, so that employment
can even increase substantially.
History provides examples of each ofthese effects. In U.S. agriculture, rapid
technological change linked with modest growth in demand for output led to
substantial displacement of workers from the agricultural sector. In 1900 nearly
12 million workers, or40 percent of the labor force, were employed in agricul-
ture; today, agricultural employment is just over 3 million, or 3 percent of the
labor force. In automobile manufacturing, rapid technological change led to
substantial reduction of automobile prices and to increased demand and greater
employment in the early to mid-twentieth century. More recently, in telephone
communications, high productivity growth from rapid technological change
between 1960 and 1975 was coupled with substantial increases in output and
employment; the number of people employed declined in some occupations,
such as telephone operator, while it increased in others, such as customer serv-
ice representative.
Overall technological change and shifts in consumer demand have resulted in
an employment shift to services over the last several decades. In 1950 about 48
percent of the civilian employed labor force (59 million workers) worked in the
goods-producing sector (agriculture, mining, construction, and manufactur-
ing), while 52 percent worked in the service-producing sector (transportation
and public utilities; wholesale and retail trade; finance, insurance, and real
estate; business and personal services; and government). By 1980 only 31 per-
cent of the labor force (99 million workers) worked in the goods-producing
sector, while 69 percent worked in the se~vice-producing sector (Monthly L`z-
bor Review, January 1985; calculated from Tables 1 and 91. The percentage
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COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
increase in employment in the service-producing sector was 143 percent, com-
pared with 39 percent in the goods-producing sector. Among the industries
within the service sector with the fastest-growing employment over the 30-year
period were government (169 percent); finance, insurance, and real estate (173
percent); and business and personal services (234 percent).
Technological change coupled with shifts in consumer demand for specific
products is, of course, only one source of change in the level of employment.
Changes in aggregate demand are equally if not more important. Unusual
changes in labor supply also contribute to changes in employment and unem-
ployment. The baby-boom cohorts born after World War II were associated
with a dramatic increase in young entrants to the labor market that exacerbated
youth unemployment during the 1970s and 1980s. These decades will be fol-
lowed by several in which the relatively small cohorts of the 1970s and 1980s
will enter the labor market.
According to a recent study in the Monthly Labor Review (Podgursky, 1984),
unemployment has increased substantially over the past several business cy-
cles. Between 1969 and 1982, unemployment at the troughs increased by 4.8
percentage points, and unemployment at the peaks increased by 3.8 percentage
points. One explanation for this long-term increase in unemployment is the
rapid growth in the labor force, especially among youth and women; unem-
ployment from this source could be viewed as frictional, associated with the
normal difficulties new entrants have in finding work. Podgursky finds this
source an important factor in the early 1970s, but by the late 1970s and early
1980s, prime-age men were the group whose unemployment contributed most
to the increase. This finding is consistent with his finding that blue-collar work-
ers in manufacturing contributed disproportionately to the unemployment in-
crease over the period. This result in turn suggests that structural shifts in de-
mand were important, although Podgursky argues that the data suggest a
possible overall slackening in aggregate demand as well.
Concerns about levels of employment were the major motivation for an im-
portant earlier examination of the relation between employment and technolog-
ical change. Twenty years ago the U. S. National Commission on Technology,
Automation, and Economic Progress (1966) issued its report and six volumes
of supporting studies. With the general increase in employment that has oc-
curred since the late 1960s, the questions that motivated it are relevant again
today: "Had the pace of technological change accelerated until the economy
could no longer make adequate adjustments? Was technological change a major
cause of persistently high general levels of unemployment? Was the new tech-
nology so twisting the demand for labor that the undereducated and unskilled
were becoming unemployable while the demands for highly trained manpower
were insatiable?" (Bowen and Mangum, 1966: 1~. The commission found that
fears of massive unemployment because of technological change were unwar-
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
17
ranted: the pace of technological change had not accelerated much if at all, and
even the skill mismatch was exaggerated. However, the commission did predict
that the situation for minority workers and for youth would worsen substantially
if appropriate training programs were not instituted, a prediction that has
proved to be correct. Despite the fact that women's rapid entrance into the labor
force had already begun, it is interesting to note that not a word was said about
any special needs or different experiences that women might have in the labor
market.
Employment Quality The commission's report was also relatively silent on
another aspect of employment the quality of work. Today, concern about
changes in employment quality is voiced along with concern about quantity. At
a 1982 international conference on office work and the new technology, orga-
nized by the Working Women Education Fund, speaker after speaker warned of
the dangers to job quality posed by the new office technologies (Marschall and
Gregory, 19831. Machung (1983), for example, warned of secretarial work
becoming deskilled, repetitive, and monotonous as it is transformed into word-
processing work. In its 1983 report, The Future of Work, the AFL-CIO Com-
mittee on the Evolution of Work warned that automation would lead to down-
grading of many jobs in both factories and offices.
Some features of new technology suggest that it could contribute to a reduc-
tion in the quality of the work environment in some jobs. Early experience with
the application of microprocessing and telecommunications in the clerical sec-
tor have led to reports of discomfort or possibly more serious physical problems
that accompanied the use of video display terminals. Some workers perceived
their autonomy and opportunity for career development to have been reduced.
The new technologies have the capability of monitoring the worker's output and
behavior more closely, possibly increasing stress in the job (Feldberg and
Glenn, 1983~. For example, in 1983 and again in 1984, an information operator
was threatened with dismissal for exceeding the C&P Telephone Company's
30-second average work time per call by 3 seconds; the operator insisted she
was morally obligated to assist customers in need of extra help and to provide a
higher standard of service (CWA News, March 1983, May 1984~.
But the new technologies also have the potential to improve work quality as
they reduce drudgery and promote more integrated work processes. Many
workers have welcomed the challenge of learning new skills and mastering
complex systems. The important point is that whatever the reason for adopting
new equipment and organization of work, that very adoption opens choices that
have consequences for the quality as well as the quantity of employment. The
choices of technology made by designers, producers, purchasers, and imple-
menters (whether these seek profit, competitive advantage, a higher-quality
product, or other goals) and the way that they organize the work process in
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18
COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
relation to equipment may produce positive or negative effects, or both, on the
quality of employment.
WOMEN'S EMPLOYMENT
OVERVIEW
Women's employment has risen rapidly since World War II and especially in
the past 25 years. The increase in women workers accounted for 60 percent of
the growth in the labor force in the past decade and is expected to account for 70
percent of the growth in the next decade. The range of occupations in which
women worked also grew, as occupations held by both men and women grew
faster in the last decade than the traditionally female occupations, and women
entered many predominantly male occupations formerly closed to them. Table
1-2 shows changes in the distribution of women workers across occupations for
the past three decades.
Women's wages still remain low relative to men's, however. The ratio of
women's to men's wages for full-time, year-round work has averaged around
60 percent for several decades. In 1983 women who worked full time, year
round averaged $13,468, 64.8 percent of men's average of $20,000 (Women's
Bureau, U.S. Department of Labor, 19851. Some researchers predict that this
TABLE 1-2 Major Occupation Groups of Employed
Women, 1950-1980 (percent)
Occupation 1950 1960 1970 1980
Total women 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0
White-collar workers 52.5 56.3 61.3 63.5
Professional 12.2 13.3 15.5 15.9
Managers 4.3 3.8 3.6 6.8
Clerical 27.4 30.9 34.8 33.8
Sales 8.6 8.3 7.4 7.0
Blue-collar workers 43.9 41.8 37.9 35.5
Crafts 1.5 1.3 1.8 1.8
Operatives 20.0 17.2 14.8 10.7
Laborers 0.9 0.6 1.0 1.3
Private household 8.9 8.4 3.9 3.0
Other services 12.6 14.4 16.3 18.8
Farm workers 3.7 1.9 0.8 1.0
Managers 0.7 0.6 0.2 0.3
Laborers 2.9 1.3 0.6 0.7
SOURCE: Bianchi and Spain (1984:Table 3).
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
19
gap will close as women workers' years of experience in the labor force come to
approach more closely those of men [(Smith and Ward, 1984; Goldin, 1985~;
see, however, Treiman and Terrell (1975) and Corcoran and Duncan (1979),
who show a strong relationship between gender and earnings even when years
of labor force experience are similar for women and men]. Others believe that
reductions in discrimination will bring about a smaller wage gap (Blau and
Ferber, 1986~. In general, the percent female of an occupation is strongly corre-
lated with its average earnings: the more women in an occupation, the less it
pays. At present, job segregation by sex in the labor market is still substantial
and continues to affect women's earnings and career mobility. And significant
evidence suggests that promotional opportunities and access to on-thejob
training for women, which are at least partially determined by employer
actions, are restricted relative to those for men (Reskin and Hartmann, 1986~.
Women continue to devote more of their time off the job to home, family, and
child care than do men (Hartmann, 1981), and these family responsibilities,
which are especially burdensome for minority women, may constrain their edu-
cational and labor market opportunities. Hispanic women tend to have larger
families, and black women are more likely than white women to be single
parents with the total responsibility for raising children and financially support-
ing them.
Because women workers tend to be concentrated in a limited set of occupa-
tions, because they are sometimes less geographically mobile, and because
their access to education, training, or promotion within and across firms may be
more limited than men's, the panel expects technological change to affect
women and men differently. Because women earn less than men, they may also
have fewer resources with which to respond to technological change. If techno-
logical change affects women's employment opportunities more negatively, or
less positively, than it affects men's, it will contribute to maintaining, or even
worsening women's relatively disadvantaged status. Conversely, technological
change, if managed toward that goal, could provide a means to equalize the
status of women and men.
WHY TECHNOLOGY MAY AFFECT WOMEN DIFFERENTIALLY
Job Segregation
Job segregation by sex has been large and relatively stable in the United
States, although the past two decades have seen some decline. Women work
largely in different occupations than do men, and they are in occupations that
are predominantly female. More than 36 percent of all employed women work
in just 10 occupations, and 9 of these are female dominated: secretaries, ele-
mentary school teachers, bookkeepers, cashiers, office clerks, "managers-
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COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
not elsewhere classified," waitresses and waiters, salesworkers, registered
nurses, and nursing aides. Only 1 of the 10 largest occupations for women
workers, "managers not elsewhere classified," is among the 10 largest occu-
pations for men (see Table 1-3~. Job segregation by sex decreased in the past
decade both because female dominated occupations grew less rapidly than in
the past and because a substantial number of occupations became more inte-
grated, particularly in the professions and management. The clerical occupa-
tions, however, for the most part became more female dominated (Reskin and
Hartmann, 19861.
TABLE 1-3 Employment in the 10 Largest Occupations for Men and
Women, 1980
Ten Largest Occupations for Men
Detailed 1980 Census
Occupational Title and Code
1. Managers, n.e.c. (019)
2. Truckdrivers, heavy (804)
Number
of Men
3,824,609
1,852,443
3. Janitors and cleaners (453) 1,631,534
4. Supervisors, production(633) 1,605,489
5. Carpenters (567) 1,275,666
6. Supervisor, sales (243) 1,137,045
7. Laborers (889) 1,128,789
8. Sales representatives (259) 1,070,206
9. Farmers (473) 1,032,759
10. Auto mechanics (505) 948,358
Percentage Female
1980
26.9
2.3
23.4
15.0
1.6
28.2
19.4
14.9
9.8
1.3
1970-1980
Change in
Percentage
1970 Female
11.6
0.8
13.1 10.3
9.9 5.1
1.1 0.5
17.0 11.2
16.5 2.9
7.0 7.9
4.7 5.1
1.4 -0.1
1970- 1980
Ten Largest Occupations for Women
Change In
Detailed 1980 Census Number Percentage Female Percentage
Occupational Title and Code of Women 1980 1970 Female
1. Secretaries (313) 3,949,973 98.8 97.8 1.0
2. Teachers, elementary school (156) 1,749,547 75.4 83.9 - 8.5
3. Bookkeepers (337) 1,700,843 89.7 80.9 8.8
4. Cashiers (276) 1,565,502 83.5 84.2 - 0.7
5. Office clerks (379) 1,425,083 82.1 75.3 6.8
6. Managers, n.e.c. (019) 1,407,898 26.9 15.3 11.6
7. Waitresses and waiters (435) 1,325,928 88.0 90.8 - 2.8
8. Salesworkers (274) 1,234,929 72.7 70.4 2.3
9. Registered nurses (095) 1,232,544 95.9 97.3 - 1.4
10. Nursing aides (447) 1,209,757 87.8 87.0 0.8
NOTE: n.e.c., not elsewhere classified.
SOURCE: Rytina and Bianchi (1984).
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
Clerical Occupations
21
The growth in clerical employment during the post-World War II period
undoubtedly facilitated the increase in female labor force participation that oc-
curred over the same time period. Between 1940 and 1980, the proportion of all
workers employed as clerical workers doubled from about 10 to 20 percent,
while female participation in the labor force nearly doubled. The proportion of
women working as clerical workers also increased substantially. Clerical occu-
pations remain the mainstay of women's employment, and it is these occupa-
tions that are currently undergoing substantial technological and organizational
changes integral to broader structural changes in the service sector. The service
sector disproportionately employs clerical workers and women. Changes in
either the level of employment or the quality of work in that sector will directly,
and disproportionately, affect women. In 1981 only 6.3 percent of men worked
in clerical occupations, compared with 34.7 percent of women.
Clerical occupations are diverse along several dimensions. Some are better
paid and require more skill than others. Some are held disproportionately by
minority women; others disproportionately by majority women. Earlier waves
of automation were expected to decrease the number of clerical workers, but the
number continued to increase. Earlier automation not only had displacement
effects in individual occupations but also substantial employment-increasing
effects across occupations. Recently, innovations in computation, dictation,
and record-keeping have affected various occupations in different ways: since
1950, the number of stenographers has declined dramatically; the number of
typists, file clerks, and postal clerks has decreased since 1970; and the number
of computer operators increased substantially between 1950 and 1980 (Hunt
and Hunt, 1985a).
Scholars disagree about how to interpret emerging trends and to project the
future effects of technology on levels of clerical employment. In their well-
known study, Leontief and Duchin (1984) offer disaggregated forecasts for the
next 20 years which suggest that, relative to other occupations, clerical work
will be more affected by displacement due to computer-based automation. In
contrast, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (Silvestri et al., 1983; Silvestri and
Lukasiewicz, 1985) predicts substantial growth of clerical workers through
1995. The contradictory forecasts stem from differences in assumptions about
the rate of innovation and diffusion of various new technologies, their produc-
tivity effects, and the size of changes in final demand over time for the products
and services clerical workers help to produce. Whichever prediction turns out
to be more accurate, however, the concentration of women in clerical occupa-
tions and the concentration of technological change in the same occupations
suggest that women are likely to be differentially affected relative to men. Of
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COMPUTER CHIPS AND PAPER CLIPS
course, if women had equal opportunity in the labor market, they would almost
certainly be less concentrated in the clerical occupations and technological
change there would have less differential effects on women.
Differential Status and Access to on-the-Job Training
Even when they are in the same occupations, men and women may face
different opportunities because they work in different firms with different pay
levels (Blau, 1977; Strober and Arnold, 19851. Even within the same firms,
women and men are likely to have different access to on-thejob training and
promotion (Duncan and Hoffman, 19791. Employers' attitudes toward workers
and their treatment of them are often conditioned by gender (Reskin and Hart-
mann, 1986~. These stratification patterns may signal potentially negative ef-
fects of technological change for women in general; in addition, minority
women experience ethnic and racial prejudice as well as sex-based discrimina-
tion, which constrains their opportunities further (Malveaux, 1982~. For exam-
ple, minority women may be placed in back-off~ce jobs in which access to
promotion and training opportunities is limited. Women may also be differen-
tially affected relative to men because as workers, men and women do not enjoy
the same status and power or access to organizational and collective resources
(such as labor unions).
Differential Responsibility for Family Care
Even if men and women shared equal opportunity to benefit (or suffer) from
workplace technologies, women might be prevented from taking advantage of
opportunities because of their greater responsibility for family care and house-
work. They may also be more geographically restricted, less able to participate
in educational programs, and more constrained in their job choice. One aspect
of the capability of the new technologies may be especially relevant to differ-
ences between women and men. The microprocessor may make home-based
production economically feasible for employers, and women's household re-
sponsibilities and the lack of affordable child care may make homework espe-
cially attractive to women. Part-time homework, either on a salaried or self-
employed basis, may be preferred by some women. The new technologies may
also lead, however, to increases in involuntary part-time and temporary work,
if they have significant employment-displacing effects.
Because women have traditionally provided more care for family members
than men have and because men and many women too have seen this ar-
rangement as right and proper, some managers have developed assumptions
about women workers that are increasingly inaccurate today. One such historic
assumption is that women workers have higher turnover rates and less commit-
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TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE AND WOMEN OFFICE WORKERS
23
ment to their jobs than men because of their family obligations (Feldberg and
Glenn, 1979~. This assumption may lead to less concern about eliminating
women's jobs or to reorganizing their work in potentially inequitable ways,
such as in the creation of temporary or part-time work with limited opportuni-
ties. But changing technology and reorganization can also be an opportunity for
opening up new occupations and increasing mobility for women if the changing
characteristics of women workers, in particular their increasing attachment to
the labor force, are taken into account.
Conclusion
The panel expects that differential effects of the new technologies with re-
spect to sex are likely. And for some of the same reasons differences in
choices, opportunities, treatment we expect that some effects will also differ
among subgroups based on ethnic, racial, age, marital, educational, or geo-
graphic characteristics of women. In many areas relevant to the new technolo-
gies, however, the effects are essentially the same for all workers and all sub-
groups of women. The new technologies have monitoring capabilities, for
example, whether either women or men work with them, or both men and
women do. The work environment is equally important for all workers. This
report therefore discusses issues that apply to all workers, although they are
particularly relevant for women. It focuses primarily on technological change
in clerical occupations.
Representative terms from entire chapter:
labor force
