Economics 43.342*A (Fall Term) "Women in the Economy"

Instructor: Professor Frances Woolley

Office: D891 Loeb

Telephone: 520-2600 x 3756

Web page: http://www.carleton.ca/~fwoolley

Office hours: Monday and Friday 1:30 to 2:30, Friday 10:00 to 11:00

Introduction

This course will provide an economic analysis of women's labour force activity, including labour force participation, earnings and discrimination; women's unpaid work, including household production; the economics of marriage and divorce; national income accounting, including the valuation of unpaid work; and feminist approaches to economic theory.

The prerequisite for this course is Economics 43.100 as outlined in the 1997/98 university calendar.

Web Page and E-mail

I have set up a web page for this course, which contains copies of this course outline, old course examinations and solutions, announcements and other material.

E-mail is an excellent way to reach me, especially after 4:30 and on weekends.

Texts

The text for this course is The Economics of Women, Men, and Work, third edition, by Francine Blau, Marianne Ferber and Anne Winkler.

Grading

Component Date Weight (%)

Assignment 1 Wednesday February 11 5

Midterm Friday March 6 35

Assignment 2 Friday March 20 10

Final As scheduled 50

Assignments. Assignments should be handed in during class or during office hours on the date due. Assignments slipped under my door or handed in after 4:00 p.m. will be considered late. Late assignments will lose 10 percent for each day the assignment is late up to a maximum of 50 percent. I will generally hand assignments and midterms back in class one week after they are submitted, however marking sometimes takes longer than anticipated.

Assignment 1 will consist of short answer questions similar to midterm and final examination questions. For assignment 2 I would like you to find a newspaper or magazine article dealing with a topic relating to this course and write a 3 page (aproximately 750 words) analysis of the article using the tools of economic analysis developed in this course. What is the author arguing? Is the author correct? Why or why not? You will be marked on the originality and relevance of the article selected, the number of connections you are able to draw between the article and the topics covered in class, the quality of the economic analysis used, the structure of your essay (does it have an introductory paragraph and a concluding paragraph, are the ideas organized into paragraphs), spelling and grammar (use of spell-check and grammatik in Word or Wordperfect is highly recommended).

Students are encouraged to study together, however you are expected to write up your assignments on your own. Please note the section on "Instructional Offenses" on p. 52 of the Calendar.

Midterm. People who, for a legitimate reason, are unable to write the midterm, will be allowed to add the midterm weight to their final grade. There will be no make-up exam for students who miss the midterm.

Final grade. The midterm, assignment, and final scores will be combined to give a percentage score in the course, which will then be converted to a letter grade. The professor reserves the right to use a grading curve other than that in the 1997-98 university calendar.

Supplementals. Supplemental and Grade-raising examinations are no longer available in any courses in the Faculty of Public Affairs and Management. Please see p. 73 of the current Calendar.

Accommodations. If there is any student in this course who, because of a disability, may have a need for special accommodations, please contact the Paul Menton Center.

Readings:

Week / Beginning

January 5 (1) Basic Concepts: Economics, Sex and Gender.

Blau and Ferber chapters 1 and 2. If you have not taken any economics for a while, please read the Appendix to Chapter 1 carefully.

Statistics Canada Women in Canada: A Statistical Report 3rd ed. 1995 Catalogue no. 89-503E, especially chapter 1, 2, 6 and 7.

January 12 (2) The Division of Household Work

Blau and Ferber chapter 3 (including appendix)

Marshall, Katherine "Employed parents and the division of housework" Perspectives Statistics Canada Catalogue 75-001E Autumn 1993 pp. 23-30.

January 19 (3) Marriage and Divorce

Blau and Ferber, chapter 9, pp. 270-295.

Becker, 1991, A Treatise on the Family 2nd edition, chapters 3 and 4 (IGNORE the equations). HQ 518 B35 1991

Bergmann, Barbara 1995 "Becker's Theory of the Family: Preposterous Conclusions" Feminist Economics 1(1): 141-150.

Woolley, Frances 1996 "Getting the Better of Becker" Feminist Economics 2(1): 114-120.

January 26 (4) Valuing Household Production

Guest lecture: Professor P.N. Rowe on GDP measurement.

"Who's Counting" video. This video will be shown in class January 28 and January 30. It is examinable material. If you are unable to come to class on those dates, or if you would like to watch the video again, you can arrange a viewing or an overnight borrowing from IMS in LA D299.

Martha MacDonald "The Empirical Challenge of Feminist Economics" in Out of the Margin: Feminist Perspectives on Economics Edith Kuiper and Jolande Sap (ed.) London: Routledge, 1995, especially pp. 181-184.

Chris Jackson "Measuring and Valuing Households' Unpaid Work" Canadian Social Trends, Autumn 1996, pp. 25-29.

Note: I will be in Cuba from January 25 to February 1, so office hours will be cancelled.

February 2 (5) Participation in the Paid Labour Force

Blau and Ferber, Chapter 4 (including Appendix)

Statistics Canada Women in Canada: A Statistical Report 3rd ed. 1995 Catalogue no. 89-503E, especially chapter 1, 2, 6 and 7

February 9 (6) Earnings Differences: Human Capital or Discrimination?

Blau and Ferber, chapters 5 and 6

February 16 (7) Labour Market Discrimination and Government Policies

Blau and Ferber, Chapter 7

Dr. Seuss The Sneetches and Other Stories Random House, 1953.

Gunderson, Morley and Craig Riddell Labour Market Economics, Third Edition, Chapter 22.

February 23 Winter Break

March 2 (8) Catch-up and review, midterm examination

March 9 (9) Women and Economic Restructuring.

Blau and Ferber, chapter 8.

Armstrong, Pat "The Feminization of the Labour Force" in Isa Bakker Rethinking Restructuring: Gender and Change in Canada Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

"Men: Tomorrow's Second Sex" The Economist

March 16 (10) Women and Poverty: Government Policies

Blau and Ferber, Chapter 7 (p. 218 to end)

Gunderson and Muszynski Women and Labour Market Poverty, chapters 1,2 and 7. DDV CA1 SW 90W54

March 23 (11) Women and Development

Sen, Amartya K. "Gender and Cooperative Conflicts" from I. Tinker, Persistent Inequalities, 1990

Bina Agarwal "Gender, Property and Land Rights" in Out of the Margin: Feminist Perspectives on Economics Edith Kuiper and Jolande Sap (ed.) London: Routledge, 1995.

March 30 (12) Women in the Economics Profession

Julie Nelson "Feminism and Economics" Journal of Economic Perspectives 9 (2): 131-148, Spring, 1995.

Anderson, Gordon, Dwayne Benjamin and Melvyn Fuss "The Gender Effect in Economics Principles Courses" CSWEP (Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession) Newsletter, June, 1993, pp. 2-4.

Patricia Horn "Walls are Falling for Women in Economics, but Slowly" CSWEP Newsletter, Winter, 1994, pp. 8-9.