Women in Precarious Work

Men and women often experience differently in terms of social and political status, education, opportunity, work, wage etc. There is an element of gender biasness when it comes to labor participation. It is often seen that lucrative, organized and high paying jobs are considered as organized and non-precarious, and men usually occupies these positions. While those jobs which do not have the above-mentioned characteristics are considered as unorganized and even undervalued, and women in most cases tend to occupy these positions. The over-representation of women in precarious work setting also highlights the discriminatory practices and biasness in organized workplaces, where employers prefer male employees. In any society, it is women who mostly take up family nurturing responsibilities compared to men. As such, apart from unequal opportunities in education, wage, skills and other opportunities, women tend to engage more in part-time jobs or take up precarious work with no union benefits, insurance or protection. In this paper, in order to understand why precarious works are taken up by women and its impact on women and society, two theories are discussed along with some forms of precarious works.