Going into the Great Depression in the United States, the 1930 census showed about 24.3% or about eleven million women being employed. 30% of the working women were employed in domestic services. The 1940 census didn’t show a very large change in the number of working women as about 25.4% of women in the United States were employed. That is only a 1.1% increase of the number of women employed between the 1930’s and the 1940’s. (Baughman, 2001). Prior to the Great Depression about 50% of college graduates were women. However during the Great Depression when men found themselves without work, the gender gap began to grow in favor of men. By 1940 only 6% of men and 4% of women had graduated from a four year university. (Snyder, 1993).
World War II sent around sixteen million men into the armed forces. Not only were there many openings in jobs where men had left but factories began working twenty-four/seven. Due to the need for workers, the amount of women in the workforce jumped to around 37%. Women filled all jobs including jobs previously considered masculine. For example, originally about 1% of the aircraft industry workforce was women but by 1943 that number increased to around 65%. (History, 2010). Upon men returning from the war, not only were women forced to return jobs to men but the gender gap between men and women graduating college also widened considerably. By 1947 college men outnumbered college women by 2.3 to 1 with men still outnumbering women graduating college by 1.60 to 1. (Goldin, 2006).
