This research will compare the status of women in the United States with that of the women in China. Major factors that affect women in these two countries, such as education, marriage, children, and career opportunities, will be discussed.
Women in the United States, at each level of education, earn less than men. For example, women with professional degrees earned an average of $2,866 per month and men $5,647. Business and education are the most common degree fields. Some degree fields are dominated by men, and others by women. For instance, 87 percent holding their highest degree in engineering were men. On the other hand, 72 percent whose highest degree was in education were women.
American family life has changed greatly over the last three decades. In 1990, most women between the ages of 20 and 24 had never been married (63 percent of the women). Yet as recently as 1960, only 28 percent of the women this age had not been married. In 1990, those women aged 25 to 29 also were much less likely to have ever been married (31 percent). Consequently, by 1990, the median age at first marriage (23.9 years) was the highest it has been this century.
As fewer young adults marry, there are more premarital births. For instance, about 2.2 million women who gave birth for the first time between 1985 and 1989 had never been married--three times the amount from the period between 1960 and 1964. In the late 1980s, 22 percent of first births occurred before marriage for white women aged 15 to 34; for black women, the proportion rose from 42 to 70 percent over this period; the comparable increase for Hispanics was 19 to 38 percent.
The period between 1970 and 1990 saw a doubling of the proportion of married women with preschool-age children in the labor force--from 30 to 59 percent. Also, three in four married women with children of school age were in the labor force in 1990, up from 49 percent 20 years earlier. T...