Women in workforce – News, Research and Analysis – The Conversation

February 22, 2026

The work women do has changed. The case for pay equity in NZ hasn’t

Lisa Meehan, Auckland University of Technology; Gail Pacheco, Auckland University of Technology, and Thomas Schober, Auckland University of Technology

Over 50 years, NZ women moved into men’s jobs but men didn’t move the other way. New data, published ahead of a major report, shows why pay equity still matters.

Uber wealthy couples are rather traditional when it comes to who works and who doesn’t. EXTREME-PHOTOGRAPHER/E+ via Getty Images

May 31, 2023

Most super rich couples have breadwinning husbands and stay‑at‑home wives, contrasting sharply with everyone else

Jill Yavorsky, University of North Carolina – Charlotte and Sarah Thebaud, University of California, Santa Barbara

While most heterosexual couples are dual-earners, super rich couples continue to have gender-traditional arrangements in which the man is the sole breadwinner.

Zero-sum competitive environments that set up winners and losers may be less appealing to women. Photo and Co/The Image Bank via Getty Images

March 23, 2022

An emphasis on brilliance creates a toxic, dog‑eat‑dog workplace atmosphere that discourages women

Andrea Vial, New York University

A focus on raw intellectual talent may unintentionally create a cutthroat workplace culture. New research suggests women’s preference to avoid that environment may contribute to gender gaps in some fields.

Women who work outside the home in Papua New Guinea often continue shouldering the same domestic and child care responsibilities as before. Rachel Gilbert and Gracie Rosenbach, IFPRI

January 26, 2021

Feeling relatively poor increases support for women in the workplace – but men still don’t want them making household decisions

Katrina Kosec, Johns Hopkins University and Cecilia Hyunjung Mo, University of California, Berkeley

A new study explores how feelings of relative poverty can negatively affect gender dynamics among households.

October 2, 2018

‘Wifehood’ is not old‑fashioned – here’s why it matters

Shani Orgad, London School of Economics and Political Science

The Wife: my research shows that this self-sacrificing form of wifehood is hardly history.

More women than men were left standing after the war and pandemic. Library of Congress

March 1, 2018

How the devastating 1918 flu pandemic helped advance US women’s rights

Christine Crudo Blackburn, Texas A&M University; Gerald W Parker, Texas A&M University, and Morten Wendelbo, American University

With many men ‘missing’ from the population in the aftermath of the 1918 flu, women stepped into public roles that hadn’t previously been open to them.

Why is America missing good-quality child care? Philippe Put

August 31, 2016

To fix America’s child care, let’s look at the past

Corey Shdaimah, University of Maryland, Baltimore and Elizabeth Palley, Adelphi University

Both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump have called for improved child care. There is already a long history of child care policy initiatives in the U.S.; most of them have been unsuccessful.

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