University of Pennsylvania ScholarlyCommons Departmental Papers (SPP) School of Social Policy and Practice September 2005 Women and the Paradox of Inequality in the Twentieth Century Michael B. Katz University of Pennsylvania,
[email protected] Mark J. Stern University of Pennsylvania,
[email protected] Jamie J. Fader University of Pennsylvania Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/spp_papers Recommended Citation Katz, M. B., Stern, M. J., & Fader, J. J. (2005). Women and the Paradox of Inequality in the Twentieth Century. Retrieved from https://repository.upenn.edu/spp_papers/45 Permission granted by George Mason University Press. Reprinted from Journal of Social History, Volume 39, Issue 2, 2005, pages 65-88. Publisher URL: http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/journal_of_social_history/v039/39.1katz.pdf This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/spp_papers/45 For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Women and the Paradox of Inequality in the Twentieth Century Abstract Throughout American history, male/female has defined an enduring binary embodied in access to jobs, income, and wealth.Women’s economic history shows how for centuries sex has inscribed a durable inequality into the structure of American labor markets that civil and political rights have moderated but not removed. This economic experience of women reflects the paradox of inequality in America: the coexistence of structural inequality with individual and group mobility.Women, like African Americans, have gained what T.H. Marshall labeled civil and political citizenship. No longer are they legally disenfranchised, and discrimination on account of race and gender is against the law.