Abstract: There are still many problems in women's employment in today's society, mainly the disadvantages of gender discrimination and women's employment thought. This paper analyzes the two current situations of modern women's employment and the reasons behind them, and puts forward some suggestions to solve the problem of urban women's employment.

[Keywords:] female employment; Gender discrimination; Employment concept; Protection of rights

Nowadays, with the process of global modernization and China's modernization, especially after China entered the stage of deepening reform and establishing modern industrial structure, it has provided new opportunities for women's employment. In addition, with the advancement of the global women's liberation movement, women's employment situation has been greatly improved. For example, women's employment rights are protected by national policies, laws and regulations, employment fields have expanded, and employment methods tend to be diversified. However, there are still many problems in women's employment. These problems are like water that a thirsty crow can see but can't reach, which has become a tangible and intangible obstacle to women's employment.

First, the analysis of the current situation of female employment

(A), obstacles to gender discrimination

As a group that exists with men, women are bound to be compared. Women's employment is influenced by traditional factors and restricted by gender discrimination. Therefore, not only urban women's employment, but also women's employment all over the world is facing the problem of gender discrimination, mainly in job choice, position situation, salary gap and so on.

1. Gender barriers in job hunting

According to the data provided by the second sampling survey of women's social status in China released in 20001,the overall gap and stratification gap between men and women's social status in China still exist, mainly manifested in the decrease of female employment rate and the difficulty of re-employment. Statistics show that by the end of 2000, the proportion of urban and rural women aged 65,438+08 to 64 was 87%, 6.6 percentage points lower than that of men. Compared with 1990, the employment rates of both men and women in cities and towns have declined, from 90% to 8 1.5% for men and from 76.3% to 63.7% for women. Compared with men, the decline of women is even greater. The employment report of China in 2005 released by the National Bureau of Statistics shows that the employment rate of women is lower than that of men 1 1.4%.

This material fully shows that discrimination in choosing a job has become one of the main obstacles facing women's employment. Influenced by the traditional concept of gender division of labor, it is a common problem that women are discriminated in the field of social labor. There are many forms of discrimination against women in the process of choosing a job. Gender discrimination in women's job selection in China is mainly manifested in age, identity, gender and physical condition.

Women are often isolated because of their gender when they join the job. Many employers have become accustomed to rejecting female job seekers because they have no money to travel, which has become a "soft rib" in job hunting. Gender discrimination in job selection makes women the most stressful group in China, especially the employment problems of laid-off urban female workers and urban female college students. In March 2005, Zhaopin.com and Sina.com jointly conducted a survey on whether men and women are equal when entering the workplace. The results show that only 5.59% of female graduates think that their job search is smooth, while 28.90% think that women work harder than men, and 32.75% admit that there is gender discrimination.

According to relevant data, the employment rate of urban women in China began to decline from 1996. By the end of 2000, the absolute number of female employees in urban units in China had decreased by14.777 million. When many enterprises implement optimal combination, female workers are given priority to be dismissed. According to the survey in Jinan, female employees account for 70%~80% of the surplus staff. Among the laid-off workers of a wireless power plant in Beijing 107, 95 were women, accounting for 87% of the laid-off workers. In addition, the main data report of the second sample survey on the status of women in China generally thinks that it is difficult to find a job. Among them, 49.7% people think that they are discriminated against by age and sex when they are re-employed, which is 18.9 percentage points higher than that of laid-off men.

These cases show that in recent years, urban women's employment has highlighted a new problem, that is, the scale of women's unemployment has been expanding, and it is more difficult for laid-off women workers to re-employment.

2. Gender barriers in the process of taking office.

A 32-year-old young lady had six job-hopping experiences. She said: "The first time I worked in a private enterprise as the secretary of the factory director. At that time, I was particularly afraid of the boss's colored eyes and hands and feet, and lived in white terror all day. I couldn't take it anymore and resigned angrily. Later, I transferred to a corporate office as a publicity officer. During my work, I tried to exert my writing ability and work hard to do my best. Most of the publicity activities in the factory are planned by me, and there are different degrees of recognition and rewards every year. However, I always miss promotion opportunities again and again. Although the salary is ok, I just can't get used to the narrow gender view that women can't be reused. Later, job-hopping was always unlucky, either because I met a male boss who was full of desire for sex or because there was no working environment that made my eyes shine. "

This case reveals some problems of women's employment situation, that is, the male-dominated occupations in China are far greater than those dominated by women. In addition, "female" occupations are often not as valuable as "male" occupations, because "male" occupations have low income, low status and few promotion opportunities. This result shows that in the labor market, women are more restricted and less attractive than men. The main reason for the employment inequality between men and women is the gender segregation between different occupations and industries.

Most women can't jump out of the box of "three more and three less" That is, there are more vacant posts than real posts, more supporting roles than leading roles, and more deputy posts than full posts. First of all, women's position in employment is generally lower than that of men, and their chances of promotion are relatively low. Women are always regarded as inferior to men in knowledge and ability, so it is difficult for them to enter high-level decision-making and management departments; Secondly, the employment rate of women in informal sectors such as community service and domestic service is much higher than that of men; Thirdly, women are mainly concentrated in some so-called "suitable for women" fields. The employment of urban women in China is mainly concentrated in manufacturing, wholesale and retail, trade, catering, health sports and social welfare, and these industries are mostly auxiliary, with low technical level, low employment threshold and low income, so it is difficult to have promotion opportunities. However, in leading, high-tech and high-income industries, such as state party and government organs and social organizations, scientific research and comprehensive technical services, construction, real estate, transportation and so on, the proportion of women is far lower than that of men. Even if women are employed in these fields, it is difficult to get attention. To this end, many women have to change their working environment again and again in order to make a breakthrough.

3. Gender differences in wage income.

The Evaluation Report on the Implementation of the Development Program for Women and Children in China shows that the average annual income of men is more than 23,564 yuan, while that of women is only 65,438 yuan+05,292 yuan, which is only about 65% of that of men. The income gap has increased by 8 percentage points compared with 2000. In society, women often engage in low-paid jobs. Although women account for 60% to 70% in the fields of economy, finance and culture with higher income, men still occupy a certain dominant position in the management.

The income gap between men and women in Shanghai and its expanding trend are also the same problems faced by women in all cities in China. This is also the result of the vicious circle brought by gender barriers to women's employment in the process of job hunting and employment. Due to the widespread gender segregation in the social labor field, the employment rate of women is lower than that of men, and most of them are concentrated in low-skilled, low-paid and part-time jobs, which makes the income of men and women unequal. Even if women's employment level is improved, due to social prejudice against women, women have much less opportunities to receive professional and technical training, further study and promotion than men, which affects their competitiveness and promotion qualifications and causes the gap between women's wages and men's. Especially after China's entry into WTO, the income gap between men and women in China has widened. A large number of foreign trade enterprises attract more high-quality talents with high salaries, which leads to the shortage of brainworkers engaged in high-tech and high-intelligence services in China's labor market, while the demand for simple manual workers is facing a situation of oversupply. At present, men account for a large proportion in high-income levels such as high technology and high-level management, while women account for a large proportion in simple labor. This trend may widen the income gap between men and women.

(B), women's employment concepts and ideological ills

1, abnormal thinking of women choosing jobs

According to the survey and ranking of industries that women in Wuhan want to engage in in in 2000, the results show that the number of people who want to engage in state organs, political party organs and social organizations is the largest, accounting for 57.5%, followed by education, culture and art, radio, film and television, accounting for 48.2%, and financial insurance, accounting for 42.6%. In addition, transportation, warehousing, post and telecommunications, health, sports, social welfare, etc. are all top industries. However, geological exploration, water conservancy management, agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery, mining and construction are industries that women generally do not want to find employment.

This case shows that when choosing a career, women still choose the most stable, secure and decent office in government agencies and state-owned units as their first choice, while those occupations that only touch the word "service" are regarded as inferior or dismissive. Due to the traditional concept of employment, women are inconsistent with social needs, and women lack a deep understanding of their social responsibilities, historical missions and creativity, which leads to the backwardness of employment concept, which is not conducive to women's social value as an equal group with men, and thus affects women's employment.

2. Inferiority and lost mentality caused by employment prejudice.

From the perspective of urban women themselves, the weaknesses accumulated over thousands of years, such as attachment, inferiority, narrowness, conservatism and psychological fragility, have become obstacles to their own development. Because of the pressure of employment difficulties, they lack confidence and courage and give up on themselves; In the process of applying for a job and taking office, I have been subjected to all kinds of discrimination and difficulties, gradually becoming afraid of difficulties, accustomed to obeying others, gradually losing my pursuit and lacking the spirit of pioneering and innovation. These psychological disadvantages of women, on the one hand, are the vicious results of gender discrimination against women's employment in objective society, on the other hand, they are also bad habits accumulated by thousands of years of traditional backward concepts, which have had a negative impact on women's employment in any case.

3, excessive pursuit of interest value in job hunting.

At the same time, women also hope to occupy an increasingly important position in society. For modern women, some careers seem to be helpless choices. Especially, some urban women, such as college graduates, lack the actual orientation of their own value status, which leads to many obstacles in choosing a job. Some laid-off women workers in cities would rather be unemployed at home than employed in some service industries. Modern service industry has high technical level, high requirements and high threshold. People pay attention to the market economic benefits of input and output, and the bottleneck of female employment is getting narrower and narrower.

Second, explore the causes of urban female employment problems

(A), gender discrimination in education investment

Since the 1990s, women's education level in primary schools, middle schools and universities has been lower than that of men's, and the higher the education level, the greater the difference between men and women, resulting in fewer opportunities and shorter time for women to receive education, which has always caused women to be at a disadvantage in social professional skills, restricted women from engaging in high-tech and high-quality industries, and also had a negative impact on entering top management.

(2) Distorting women's physiological values and treating women's sense of family responsibility as a weakness.

Physiologically speaking, women have to face the test of pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding. This "third period" not only affects the efficiency of the unit, but also helps to ensure that many units are reluctant to recruit female employees. In fact, women are not only material reproducers, but also undertake the task of human reproduction, but this has not won social recognition and respect. Recently, there have been signs of "letting women go home", making housework a proprietary profession, which is actually obliterating women's social attributes, and in the final analysis, setting ideological obstacles for women's employment.

(c) Lack of operational legal provisions to protect equal employment between men and women

The Constitution of People's Republic of China (PRC), the Labor Law, the Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests and other laws have all expounded and stipulated gender discrimination in employment. Article 48 of the Constitution stipulates: "The state protects women's rights and interests and implements equal pay for equal work for men and women." Article 13 of the Labor Law stipulates: "Women enjoy equal employment rights with men. When hiring employees, except for jobs or posts that are not suitable for women as stipulated by the state, women shall not be refused employment or the employment standards for women shall be raised on the grounds of gender. " Article 22 of the Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests also clearly stipulates: "The state guarantees that women enjoy equal labor rights and social security rights with men."

But the problem is that the above provisions are more than principled and less operational. Liu Minghui, an associate professor at China Women's University, pointed out that China's laws have never defined the concept of gender discrimination in employment. To eliminate gender discrimination in employment, legislation must first clarify this issue, even what gender discrimination is and what can be done to protect victims. At the same time, the judicial system of gender discrimination disputes in China is relatively backward at present. What kind of punishment should an enterprise receive after being judged as sexist? The lack of relevant laws and regulations cannot effectively deter illegal enterprises. The judicial department rarely files a lawsuit against gender discrimination in employment, not to mention the successful judicial decision to safeguard women's equal employment rights.

(d) The maternity protection system for women is not perfect.

At present, the socialized maternity insurance mechanism has not been established in our city, and employers have not received due compensation for recruiting female employees, but have increased the labor cost, thus refusing to recruit women.

(e) Possible adverse effects of flexible employment methods on women's employment rights.

The diversification trend of women's employment includes the diversification of willingness and methods to choose employment units, the flexibility of working hours, and the diversification of workplaces and forms of employment. This is the result of social development and the improvement of female employment, but it is also a double-edged sword. The trend of overemphasizing the diversity of employment methods has actually played a negative role in women's employment security.

One-sided emphasis on flexible and diverse employment methods can easily lead to misunderstanding of women's employment and career development, and women's careers can be "flexible" or even dispensable, thus affecting the stability of some women's employment situation and the continuity of career development, and creating opportunities for some enterprises to dismiss female employees at will. In addition, "flexible" jobs are often associated with lower wages, limited social security, and lower professional prestige and future.

Flexible female employees are often considered by enterprises to be more mobile, so enterprises may refuse to invest and develop their human capital, and rarely give them opportunities for promotion, and often put them in positions with low importance and high unemployment risk. Once the business efficiency is not good, the first consideration is to lay off these "flexible" women workers. Therefore, the employment rights and interests of female workers are often not guaranteed.

In the most "flexible" non-state-owned enterprises, the labor protection of female employees can not be guaranteed. Some surveys show that some non-state-owned enterprises (including foreign-funded enterprises and private enterprises) do not implement the labor protection regulations for female employees, ignore the special protection that female employees should enjoy during pregnancy, childbirth and lactation, ignore the interests of female employees, forcibly take long holidays for pregnant women, or lay off employees under the pretext of protecting female employees; Some factories implement early retirement, five years earlier than the normal retirement age, generally around 45 years old, and some even advance the retirement age of female employees to 42 years old.

Some enterprises use flexible working hours to exploit women in disguise. Although the "flexible working system" gives employed women more freedom of choice, enabling them to choose working hours to take care of their families in the conflict of roles, it is welcomed by some women. However, some enterprises just use "flexible working hours" to confuse work and rest hours and exploit female employees in disguise.

Third, to solve the problem of women's employment related recommendations

(a), improve the supervision mechanism of law enforcement, increase penalties.

On the one hand, it is necessary to establish a labor protection supervision and inspection institution with the government labor department as the main body and relevant departments as the participants, regularly check the law enforcement situation of enterprises, promptly correct existing problems, and seriously deal with cases that infringe on the rights and interests of female employees according to law. Conduct regular spot checks on industries and enterprises with outstanding illegal acts, deal with problems in a timely manner and make rectification within a time limit, prevent and put an end to the occurrence of infringement, and investigate legal responsibilities for illegal operators; On the other hand, it is necessary to gradually establish and improve the legal supervision organization of trade unions, form a network and system, and combine it with judicial supervision, administrative supervision and public opinion supervision to supervise enterprise infringement and promote enterprises to implement various laws and regulations.

(b) Promote the change of women's employment concept and grasp the opportunities brought by the diversification of employment forms.

Faced with the severe employment situation, some female workers are still "waiting, relying and wanting". Preferential policies of "equal" countries; Relying on the help of the organization to take care of it; Want an ideal job. Some people even insist that they would rather be poor with state-owned enterprises than work for private enterprises. Under the domination of these concepts, even if there are some positions that need women, unemployed women are dismissive of personal face or enterprise attributes, resulting in a great dislocation between labor supply and demand. Relevant social departments, especially women's organizations, should help female workers fully understand the diversified forms of employment, update their employment concepts, and master and make full use of the diversified forms of employment to start businesses.

(3) Develop education and employment skills training to improve women's knowledge and skills.

If women's knowledge and skills are not effectively improved, it is difficult to effectively promote women's employment only by meeting their basic needs and improving their external environment. Therefore, we must vigorously develop vocational education and skills training, ensure that women have equal opportunities to receive knowledge and skills training, improve women's knowledge and skills, enhance their employability and career development ability, and let them play their potential in positive life experiences.

Perfecting the social security system is the guarantee for women's employment.

Social security includes employment security, old-age security, medical security, maternity security and industrial injury security, among which maternity security is particularly prominent because it is unique to women. In the competition between men and women in the labor market, the most unfavorable thing for women is childbirth. The stage characteristics of women's employment and human investment make their human resources stock less than that of men.

From a macro point of view, we should promote the rational flow of labor force, gradually improve the overall planning and coverage of social security, change the phenomenon that too many social security functions are undertaken by enterprises at present, and take effective measures to stimulate the enthusiasm of different ownership units to hire female employees. Establish and implement social security systems such as unemployment insurance for employees, pension subsidies, medical subsidies and maternity compensation. Ensure that all employed people can participate in and enjoy social security and eliminate de facto inequality. Microscopically, in order to safeguard women's personal rights and labor rights, further implement the Labor Law, the Law on the Protection of Women's Rights and Interests, and constantly improve the working environment conditions of female employees, we should formulate laws and policies to adapt to the new employment situation and protect the rights and interests of female employees in foreign-funded enterprises, towns, private enterprises and other non-state-owned enterprises.

(5) Caring for women's mental health.

Governments at all levels should coordinate health, civil affairs, women's federations and other departments, and regard women's mental health as an important issue in the construction of urban civilization; It is necessary to increase investment in this area, such as supporting the establishment of mental health clinics and psychological counseling hotlines specifically for women in communities or hospitals, and establishing sexual psychological counseling service centers and mental health education and training bases linked to relevant institutions. Mass media should widely publicize women's mental health knowledge and actively guide people to pay attention to women's mental health.

The female employment problem is an important part of the employment problem in China, and solving the urban female problem is an important step to solve the employment problem in China and stabilize social development. The key lies in perfecting the legal system to protect women's employment rights, eliminating female discrimination, improving women's employment concept and improving women's employment level.

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