Women's employment and unemployment

Abstract

Over the past 3 years the Department of Employment has commissioned a considerable body of research on various aspects of women's work which has either been recently completed or will shortly be so. The main platform of this research has been a large-scale survey of women and employment which is due to be published in 1984. Other major studies have looked at the impact of redundancy on women, the effect of the maternity provisions of the Employment Protection Act on return to work after childbirth, and various aspects of pay, whilst smaller studies have looked at female unemployment (both registered and unregistered) and the likely impact of microelectronic technology on women's employment.

The paper discusses the underlying thinking behind the research, indicates areas of further research needed to give a fuller understanding of female participation in the labour market and attempts to draw out the likely implications of this research for the future.

Notes

∗ The views expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the Department of Employment.