Blog 14

Dr Frost said that ‘incarcerating women has a profound effect on the families and communities left behind’ it automatically made me think of how our economy slipped after we started cracking down on illegal immigration. Society is a delicate balance and I believe so much has been thrown off that society is crumpling under its own weight; female incarceration which is rapidly increasing is just one of the many factors.
Separating workers lives into private and work increases the female gender role of care taker. Women and men are expected to go into very different realms of work, so the private life of child care which is usually left up to women is pushed even farther away from males and the workplace. Gendered concepts are more set in stone, than actual gender roles (families are all different) which can be increasingly frustrating in the workplace, if women in more male dominated work places cannot get child care they have less of a chance making a case. A female working in child care or another female dominated profession would have an easier time getting child care and not having to fully separate private and working life.
Structures in prisons are very gender based, most guards are males or they are white (male and female). Society places female guards in a category playing down their feminity/ nurturing. The prisons don’t have childcare which also harms the female inmates children place them in foster homes. Men do not have to worry as much as their female co workers about domestic responsibilities because they are less likely to be a sole care giver, or they have a wife. Men also in general make more keeping females from dominating the work place and helping their status in society. Women suffer in organization that are gendered simply because they are newer to the work place and they are required to keep private life private they do not have the ability to be a mother/wife in the work place.

blog 13

In movies, television, and stories police officers and correctional guards are mostly white men. Women do not have the stature or a lot of times the typical attitude of stereotypical police/ guards/officers. They are going to go through more problems than men who go through training. People in the field already (males) are going to be more cynical of females wanting to enter the field. Judging by peers is more detrimental to the worker is going to cause more stress and ultimately cause more women not to join the force.
When I think of female correctional officers or police I think of a more masculine women, I believe this is because every time I mention my major someone always asks ‘you want to be a cop?’ with a raised eyebrow. No I do not want to be a cop, I don’t think I have what it takes physically or mentally but why does everyone need to be shocked at the idea of it? Is it because I am small, because I wear dresses and make up? Or is it because of my gender alone? I don’t think I have the confidence that many women in the field have, plus I have no idea how I would handle the stress of the job. I don’t fit into the mold of stereotypical police officer, most women I know don’t but I know one woman who went through fire fighter training with mascara on so you never know who has that interest and passion.
There are definite images portrayed in the media of correctional officers in different prisons. Women’s prisons seem to have a more backwoods image whereas most men’s prisons seem very urban. I have no idea whether that is because of the population inhabiting the prison or not. Women’s prisons are just as dangerous because women inmates are just as problematic, they may or may not have as much force behind their violence but it is still a problem. Female officers are probably in way more danger in men’s prisons due to the fact that they are female and the inmates will go after them instead of a bigger masculine guard. I think women are just as capable obviously but in the eyes of men they are not. It is hard to work that kind of job when people who need to trust you can’t and it’s hard to work in a place where you are constantly doubted.

blog 12

Men and women are supposed to have equality in the workplace, but where men dominate women take pay cuts and cannot seem to do anything about it. Women are gaining more presence in nontraditional workplaces, this way they can make more money because they are more of a commodity. With that being said many women still face sexism in the workplace due to their male bosses or co workers who are not trying to break ground but who have already established themselves in that workplace. Most jobs that are male dominated have been that way since the beginning; women are new to the field and therefore are a minority, in many cases minorities do not always fair well. Many women will find it hard to break into these professions because of engrained gender roles in society, many men and even women believe manual labor is only for men. Only small percentages of women take up roles in the fields of labor and skills, this is due to both beliefs of tradition and the unwillingness of men in dominated roles. Things are changing due to this economy and women are finding themselves in more and more nontraditional roles.
Women and men both benefit from women having more nontraditional jobs. Women gain skills most do not have and can capitalize on that, they have the abilities to make more money than they would by doing receptionist work or child care. These nontraditional jobs give single mothers a chance to make more money without giving up as much time with their children. Jobs that most women don’t break into give more opportunities not only to women but to their families plus they give women more work that is needed and usually will pay for training. I believe men still are benefitting from women working in nontraditional roles, by diversifying the workplace men have different views on their jobs, plus women still do not make up enough of the nontraditional workplace to make any negative effect on their male counterparts.

Disappointing

From unemployment rates,to a magazine cover struggling working poor especially women with children are very much in the media. Nothing is being done about it though.

blog 11

Erin Brockovich is a good example of a working mother struggling with child care issues, money issues, and holding onto a job. Granted the movie turns a job into a career and she deals with somewhat neglecting her children but this is what a lot of women deal with. Erin’s neighborhood was mixed income, and in the beginning of the movie the women who was taking care of her children was incredibly unreliable. This is a completely normal situation for many single mothers who cannot afford regular day care. Also Erin doesn’t eat dinner one night so that her children can, although Erin does have some luck when she finds a good care giver she has to cope with her children missing her and having to sacrifice time with them to put food on the table.
Many women even high income ones face struggles when it comes to being a mother and having a job. Finding adequate child care isn’t the only problem it is a main one but finding someone who you trust your child to who is also willing to be stable and help work with them on an educational level is ridiculously hard to find anywhere, it’s almost impossible to find in low income neighborhoods. Single mothers don’t have the funds to pay for child care and that hurts not only the mother but the child in question, also it is hurting the child’s future and the child’s ability to learn so they can earn more later in life. Children need to be able to get a better education then their parents did so that they can one day pull themselves and possibly their families out of low income and into better neighborhoods and schools. Although their mothers may not have the opportunity to earn more money and thus give their children more we need to provide so that yet another generation will not end up in poverty.

blog 10

Some of the women talk about living in shelters and going on assisted living to get out of bad living situations. These women go through very poor situations only to put themselves in a shelter and try to make enough wages to support themselves. This is yet another reason that single mothers shouldn’t not be as heavily taxed they are working they are trying but they have more obstacles then average families or low wage men. The video with tent city residences was hard to grasp because although there are tons of homeless shelters there obviously isn’t enough. With the economy the way it is and more and more people drowning financially it is not hard to imagine where women stand in these hard times. Women are usually up against more when they try to begin a job or career. Sexism is one problem but so is being a mother, single mothers have to figure out child care, and a lot of their options are not good ones. Educational child care isn’t usually an option with social networks such as grandparents neither are neighborhood day care centers that are most often too expensive. No one realizes that the unemployment rates are rising and that those numbers are made up of a lot of women. A lot of women with children, who need food, education, care, and medical treatments these families cannot afford any of these necessities and fine themselves in a increasingly bad situation.

Looking towards other countries would be fine, but many times looking at other cultures government acts on things concerning family will not work here in the United States. For one many countries (which have laws regarding children and family) have lower poverty rates, some have higher senses of family or have bigger families so social networks of child care are easier to find. Also in many countries education and school start at earlier ages so finding more child care once the child gets older isn’t always an issue. We as a country, need to acknowledge the growing child care problem and provide more pre schools and after school as well as day care centers for the growing number of working mothers. Although minimum wage has gone up little by little so have the price of living wages, that are earned in low wage jobs don’t begin to cover the expenses.

Chaudry says that most single mothers want to work and take the options given to them depending on what is best and works for them and their family. This isn’t always the best choice for the family, but it is the only choice. There is only so many options for single mothers when they aren’t making more than minimum wage. Children are not responsible for the poverty they were born into, yes it was the card they and their parents were dealt but children shouldn’t be second class citizens because of their parent’s economic status. President Clinton changing welfare and moving more people into the workforce, which is great it helped our economy and got people to start taking charge of their financial situations but now that the economy is on a serious downgrade what happens to the people who already make minimum wage? Low income workers are usually the most expendable and are usually the first on the chopping block when recession hits. Child care which is a necessity for working single mothers becomes unattainable when they either have no job or a low wage part time one while they struggle to keep what they have. The recession can also be blamed on low wages because more and more people go into debt sending more and more companies into bankruptcies. There is no escape like ‘OB’ said in the video ‘The Other America’, the vicious cycle is hitting everyone but low wage workers that don’t have a high level of education and therefore are not qualified for higher paying maybe even more stable jobs.

blog 9

“Thirty-nine percent of the nation’s children—more than 28 million in 2005—live in low-income families”

How are we allowing this to happen in the world’s richest (even though we’re going through economic turmoil) nation? Why are we letting charities like food banks and shelters bear the burden of low income and impoverished families and more importantly the children it affects? We send 39% possibly more of our nation’s children to bed without a nutritional meal that does not sound like a land of plenty. Understanding the ‘pull yourself up by the boot straps mentality’ and even believing much of it there is no possible way most of these families can do that, there are too many struggles too much hardship for these families to gain any footing since it is hard enough just to survive.

“35% of black children live in poor families. 28% of Latino children live in poor families. 29% of American Indian.”
Yes, poverty does affect minorities more, which furthers claims that the government does not care enough about them. The children of this generation and even the ones before it are not the first to suffer poverty, they come from a long line of poverty and low income. The cycle is just continuing with them as their parents or more likely mother struggles to keep afloat. Their mothers work long hours struggle to find child care which probably hurts their slim chances of finding a stable job, they collect welfare and food stamps, the children are forced to attend below par schools which will never provide them the tools to claw their way out of poverty. If they are lucky they will finish high school or even go to college but the likelihood of that is slim. The fact that they are minorities almost forced into the ghettos and project housing into bad schools and in rough neighborhoods these mothers cannot afford to give their children anything but societies scraps because that is what they can manage and that is what they are given no matter how hard they try. Children shouldn’t suffer any longer because their mothers cannot afford simple necessities because they are heavily taxed, because we don’t put enough money towards everyone’s education and because our government chooses to ignore their needs. Working mothers have a hard enough time caring for their children if we require them to work we need them to require more assistance.

Blog 8

The problems working/poor mothers in Urban poor areas face are different and similar to the mothers in mixed income areas. Their safety, health, and oppurtunites and the oppurtunities for their children and greatly different. Schools, after school programs, pre schools, housing, food, and crime rates in general lean towards a more positive aspect in mixed income areas. Many mothers do not have the ability to house their children in clean and well built homes/apartments or supply them with good food or send them to a good school in urban areas because there are simply none around.

Jessica’s video was heart breaking because she tells of how she sacrifices, she tells us how she’s scared that her children will get hurt because of her area, she talks about how hard her life is and how she wakes up every morning to find herself working for minimum wage and being surrounded by poverty. The women who introduced the videos says it immoral to expect low wage workers to raise a family. The responsibility from what I see fall almost solely on the mother, this is harsh and women who are already facing sexism in any job market have to fight to keep their jobs and to raise their children. Most of the working poor are mothers, and a lot of them are single mothers even more of these families live in low income housing. Its hard to find any relief from poverty and minimum wage when you have to surround yourself with it to survive. Its unfair to the children who go to poor schools and have to eat low quality food and do not have access to computers, to better part time jobs and do not see their mother because she has to work forty plus hours a week to scrape by.

The government’s answers to poverty fall very short of actual help that is needed. I understand we tax low income workers more because they use governmental service more often. To me this seems backwards and unhelpful that isn’t assistance that’s just sanctioning their funds to give back to them with food stamps which is extremely unhelpful. They need to stop throwing heavy taxes they need to improve the spending value of minimum wage and they need to wake up and realize that taking care of low wage workers takes care of our economy and our country as a whole.