The job stability of men working in gender non-traditional jobs

Abstract

Analyzing Current Population Survey (CPS) Tenure Supplements from 2004 through 2010 and five years of National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 97 cohort (NLSY97) data from 2004-2008, I find that the job stability of men working in gender non-traditional occupations is lower than that of men in gender traditional or gender neutral occupations. Looking at a classification of gender non-traditional occupations into educational, medical and secretarial, I find significant differences between the three groups, with high tenure in the first and low tenure in the other two. These findings contradict some of the (feminist) sociological literature that suggests men have higher job stability in gender non-traditional occupations because of upward mobility expectations and preferential treatment from male managers and supervisors. The assertion that for men, job stability is a benefit of working in gender non-traditional occupations is widely publicized by community college career websites, state departments of education, some academic studies and organizations of professionals working in gender non-traditional occupations. Such a generalization is simply misleading, as this study shows. Additional findings in this study contribute to the literature on the outcomes of men working in gender non-traditional occupations. I find that men employed in these occupations are more likely to have been threatened to be hurt at school, to have been raised in a Catholic household and less likely to have been raised in a Baptist household. My study finds evidence that self-reported job satisfaction is highest among men in gender non-traditional occupations, raising further questions about the utility that some men find in working in these occupations, given that their choices contradict theories of occupational choice (Gottfredson) and identity (Akerlof and Kranton).