Into the Marketplace Overview

"Into the Marketplace
Working-Class Women in 20th Century Hawai'i"

Teresa Bill, Exhibit Co-Director

Thematic Overview

Women have always worked.

At times they work for "wages," other times they perform household tasks for family members without pay. Always, women's labor has been essential for their own and their families' economic survival. Focusing on occupational trends, working conditions and the interrelationship between wage work and unpaid family caretaking, "Into the Marketplace: Working-Class Women in 20th Century Hawai'i" examines women's participation in the economic marketplace as income earners.

The laundry line running throughout the exhibit symbolizes the fluid exchange of women's work between the home and the labor market. For example, laundry can be done without pay for family members, for others as paid domestic service, and for wages in an industrial plant. While the site of women's wage-earning has shifted, the kind of work women perform in the market economy are often variations of the "domestic service" work they perform in the home. Thus, over the course of the twentieth century, much of women's "traditional" work in the home--food preparation, child care, laundry--has been transformed into wage-paying jobs.

Though this exhibit is about the women of Hawai'i, it reflects economic and social changes nationwide. Between 1900 and1940, Hawai'i's women entered the paid laborforce in numbers equal to the rest of the U.S. but with an important difference. The large number of married women in the laborforce (18.8% in Hawai'i in 1920 vs. 9% nationally) prefigured the development of many of the issues and concerns of contemporary working mothers and dual income families. Since 1940, Hawai'i's women have led the nation in female laborforce participation. Because Hawai'i's cost of living has been high and the wages of racial minority men in agriculture and service work low throughout the twentieth century, most working-class families in Hawai'i have required two incomes. Thus, the experiences of Hawai'i's working women can shed light on many of the issues and concerns of contemporary working women.

This exhibit discusses "income earning" broadly. It includes "waged labor" for an employer at a worksite as well as self-directed, money-making activities performed in the home. While some women performed waged labor, as agricultural or cannery workers, their sisters and neighbors earned income providing meals, clothing and laundry for the "bachelor" men of their communities. Women earning money by taking in laundry or providing other services for their overwhelmingly male communities extended their "traditional" female household roles into the marketplace for many, this was the only way to combine family responsiblities and income earning. The laundry line also represents the myriad of household tasks awaiting women after their "paid job." This "second shift" of family care extends women's work day beyond the worksite and into the night and early morning hours.

"Into the Marketplace" is arranged chronologically into three sections: "A Local Hawaiian Marketplace, 1900-1940"; "Integration into the American Marketplace, 1941-1979"; and "The Global Marketplace, 1980-2000." The exhibit ilustrates both the wide variety of occupations available to women and the various forces affecting their work lives.

Economic Opportunity

In general, the occupations of Hawai'i's working women reflect larger national economic trends but with a local twist. The following factors differentiate the local situation. Modern Hawai'i's dependence upon a few industries limits the job opportunities available to both women and men. Sugar reigned supreme in early 20th century Hawai'i and many working women earned their money from sugar--either as fieldworkers or providing the "domestic" necessities of food and laundry to the thousands of single male laborers supporting Hawai'i's agricultural empire. In urban areas, Japanese women's employment as domestic servants for Caucasian households extended the racial hierarchy of Hawai'i's workforce into the household "service sector."

Mid-century changes in Hawai'i's economy from agriculture to tourism and military support shifted the site of women's work from the "invisibility" of the home to the more visible hotel, office and retail store. These new occupations grew by leaps and bounds employing over 33,235 women in 1950 or 69% of the female workforce. Instead of cooking, cleaning and sewing for bachelor fieldworkers, women now performed these same functions in the marketplace for tourists.

Employment options for contemporary working-class women in Hawai'i are an extension of the changes first introduced in the post-WWII era of tourism and office work. Hawai'i has been at the forefront of a "service economy" for the past 50 years and women's employment in clerical work (federal, state and the private sector), retail sales and the tourism industry reflect that. The transformation of Lana'i pine workers into resort service workers reflects national economic trends. In the next 10 years, half of all newly created jobs in the U.S. are expected to be in the "service sector."

The growth of the contemporary "service sector" accelerates a circular demand for itself. Low-waged service workers are compelled by high prices to find additional income for their family. This usually means the full-time employment of both adults whose limited time and energy fuels the demand for more services in the form of commodified household tasks like laundry (dry cleaning), food service (fast food) and elder care (long term care).

While contemporary women in Hawai'i are and will continue to be generally employed in "traditional" female occupations such as clerical, administration and retail sales, new occupations are slowly opening up. No longer formally excluded from any occupation or training program, women have more opportunities to participate in and train for "non-traditional" jobs.

Skills

All jobs are not equally available to all workers. Many different factors influence the likelihood of women's participation in particular occupations. While the excuse that women lack certain skills has been used to limit and devalue women's work, certain skills, especially education, have made a difference in the jobs for which working-class women may qualify. In the early 20th century, women with high school or business school diplomas had options for better paying jobs than women without education or english language skills. Thus, secretary and telephone operators were primarily staffed by haole (white) and Hawaiian women with education beyond 8th grade.

Family Demands

"How will my children be cared for while I'm at work?" is a universal question women answer differently depending upon their community and family resources. For some women working long hours at home was the only way they could combine family responsibilities and income-earning. Others carried their babies on their back while they worked in the fields. Some women had day nurseries available at their plantations, but not all could not afford the fees. When possible, familymembers like mothers or sisters or older siblings assisted with childcare. Immigrant women, without a strong family network to draw upon, sometimes formed hui within their churches or communities to provide day care to their children.

Women took part-time, seasonal and evening shift work to balance family care and income earning. Women might work an evening shift, alternating child supervision and feeding with their husbands who worked the alternate shift. Other women worked seasonally, enduring long hours but for a predictable length of time. They knew that their opportunity to earn much needed money was limited and that both they and their families would survive a short-term schedule of long hours.

During WWII a concerted effort was made by state and federal governments to address the need for childcare for female defense workers. Thirteen public daycare centers thus opened in Honolulu. Unfortunately, once the "national emergency" was over, so too was the committment to affordable childcare. This example shows, however, how industry and government can cooperate when matters of "national" interest are involved.

For working women today, affordable childcare is still nearly non-existent. Child care is not valued economically in our society, and women pay the price. Working women cannot find "affordable" child care, so unpaid family members and low-waged day care workers subsidize Hawai'i's economy. Caring for elderly parents has also added to women's family responsibilities and therefore restricted women's available wage-earning hours.

Segregation of Labor Force

Racial as well as gender stereotypes limited the jobs available to women in Hawai'i. In the early decades of the twentieth century, preconceived ideas of the work habits of different ethnic women abounded. Japanese women were stereotyped as being quiet, neat, clean and not prone to gossip, making them ideal domestic workers. Such segregation by ethnicity was reinforced by the standard practice of acquiring jobs through community or family contacts.

While the Civil Rights Act of 1964 legislated that women could no longer be formally excluded from any occupation, most men and women continue to work in jobs that employ mostly men or women. In the U.S, almost half of all working women are employed in occupations where 80% or more of the workers are female. Stereotypes that women are better able to perform certain kinds of work reinforce this segregation, as does men's refusal to perform what our society identifies as "women's work." The term "women's work" usually indicates low wages rather than the skill or strength needed for the job. These ideas have limited both the pay and range of jobs available to women.

By contrast the training and employment of women in heavy industry during WWII is evidence that notions of "men's work" and "women's work" are determined by society rather than biological realities. Thousands of women learned and performed "traditional male" jobs such as welding, and firefighting. While "Rosie, the Riveter" was celebrated in song and popular culture, at war's end she was casually dismissed from her high-paying job and replaced by returning male war veterans. In Hawai'i and throughout the U.S., women war workers didn't leave the workforce; they simply went from well-paying manufacturing jobs to "traditionally female" clerical jobs in expanding offices. Between 1940 and 1950, female clerical workers in Hawai'i increased from 3,355 to 13,200 accounting for 27.4% of all women employed in 1950.

Images of Hawaiian Women

Throughout the exhibit, romantic images of Hawai'i's women are juxtaposed with documentation of their actual working and living conditions. "Into the Marketplace" opens with two contrasting images: the well-known image "The Lei Make" and R.J. Baker's photograph of a Hawaiian woman weaving a straw hat.

Popular prior to WWII, images of Hawaiian women became an integral part of selling Hawai'i as a tourist destination after the war. Idyllic images of carefee women singing and dancing veiled the adverse effects of rapid development on the Hawaiian people and the Island environment and contrasted sharply with the everyday reality of women's lives. While Hawaiian entertainers are the most visible Hawaiian women employed by the tourist industry, Hawaiian women are more likely to work in food service or housekeeping.

Laundry, Food and Sexual Services

"Into the Marketplace" contextualizes prostitution as an occupation produced by the industries of modern Hawai'i. In 1910, there were two men for every woman, so single seamen, plantation laborers and military personnel supported personal service jobs like laundry, food services and sewing, as well as prostitution.

Society's complex relationship to illegal prostitution becomes evident when police, military and health officials regulate prostitution. Over the course of the 20th century, different attitudes have prevailed. In 1910, prostitution was legal and regulated by the police. During World War II, the Military Governor controlled all aspects of prostitution, including where prostitutes worked, lived and spent their leisure time. Today we condemn female prostitutes without acknowledging that a large tourist and military presence supports sexual services.

Foundations for the Future

Throughout the twentieth century, working women have organized, both with men and among themselves, to demand better wages and conditions in the public and private sectors. Benefits women are beginning to receive, such as parental leave, are the result of struggles like the 1920 sugar strike, when women demanded paid maternity leave. Working-class women in Hawai'i continue to carry a great burden as they combine family responsibilities and paid work, and attempt to meet the challenges of workplace and home with strength and resourcefulness. Some issues, like childcare, recur for each generation to tackle anew. Others are resolved and replaced by new challenges like single parenthood. Facing many of the same challenges, we build upon their legacy of hard work.

Conceptual Notes:

The U.S. Census: Who is Working?

It is important to recognize the limitations of the U.S. census records when looking at female labor force participation rates. It is generally acknowleged that women's income generating activities are underrepresented in official census; for example, census takers do not consider women washing laundry at home for money as "employed." Thus women whose income-earning activities are located in the household are likely to be undercounted.

"Into the Marketplace" attempts to rectify this problem by including "wage-earning" and income-earning activities as well as unpaid household labor in its definition and discussion of work.

Who is the "Working-class?"

"Into the Marketplace" uses a definition of "working classs" that is set in opposition to a sociological definition of "professional." As defined by Everett Hughes in "The Pfrofessions in America (Houghton Mifflin, 1965), a professional job has high status, is knowlege-based, and comes with authority over clients or workers. Occupations included in the exhibit do not require formal education--beyond the 8th grade for the period until after World War II, and beyond high school or technical school for the period after the 1960s. Thus, a number of professional occupations associated with working women, such as teachers and nurses, are not represented in this exhibit.

A notable exception is the inclusion of clerical workers in the early section of the exhibit even though most women had high school or business school diplomas. They were included because once clerical work became a "female-dominated" occupation, the relative status and pay of clerical workers declined. Initially a male dominated occupation, clerical and administrative work is now considered a common, stereotypical job for women.

"Into the Marketplace Working-Class Women in 20th Century Hawai'i"