Association of Flight Attendants
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Working women have fought long and hard for the right to organize, struggling against apathy, the hostility of employers, and the antipathy of male unions. Women first formed associations that were social clubs where union men voiced their support for equal pay for equal work. The support of the union men did not extend to the picket lines. Women union struggled because workingmens jobs were threatened, many women ruined tier health trying to organize, and other leaders gave up union work for the sanctuary of marriage. The Association of Flight Attendants faced several difficulties in a male dominant industry and succeeds as a womens labor union today.
Introduction
Have your rights ever been violated because you are a woman or a man? Do you believe a womans place is at home or in the workforce? According to the Toossi (2002), women made up 60% of the workforce in 2000 and the expected annual growth rate of 2.6 percent. However, many jobs remain defined by sex: men are doctors, women are nurses; men are school principals, women are teachers; men are executives, women are secretaries. Why does the pattern persist? Womens groups have, on the whole, faced substantial difficulties in establishing and maintaining womens labor union. Association of Flight Attendants (AFA) is one exception as this womens union succeeded and has future plans.
Before the Revolutionary War, womens place was to be in the home and their work was just as important as the mens. The womans responsibilities in the home were to spin yarn, made the familys clothes, candles, and soap, gardened, tended to the animals, and to make a large enough family for continued labor supply. If the family lived in a more rural area and lived on a farmland then the womens responsibilities would also be to help manage the servants and crops.
A few women desired to be in the workforce to bring income into the household. The few women that did work were expected to quit once she was married. Married women that worked with the blessings of their husband usually were able to receive better work that the young women. The young womens jobs were limited to wet nurse, dairymaid, governess, or cook.
During the Revolutionary War, World War I, and World War II, women stepped up into the jobs created due to wartime shortages and new technology. When the war was over, most women wanted to keep their jobs but they were fired or demoted to lower paying jobs. The Company and union officials would remind them that during normal times their places were in the home. Eager for more pay and a chance for promotion, women continue to flock to “mens jobs” in increasing numbers.
Struggles of Women Trade Unions
The Stamp Act of 1765 was a direct tax by England imposed on the American colonies which required that printed materials to produce on revenue stamped paper made in London. All printed materials such as legal documents, newspapers, and other types of paper used in the colonies. This tax was to help England pay for British troops that were stationed in the colonies for the protection of invasion by other countries. The Stamp Act was an addition to other taxes already in place on English imports to the colonies such as tea, paint, and lead.
Patriot men and women who were resistant to the Stamp Act began to organize to boycott the imports. In 1765, the Patriot men called themselves as “sons of liberty” and the women called themselves the “daughters of liberty.” Daughters of Liberty are considered to be the first organized union for working women. The first organized meeting of the Daughters of Liberty was held in Providence, Rhode Island. The Daughters of Liberty also referred to themselves as an “Association of Ladies” (DePauw, 1975).
The Daughters of Liberty boycotted textiles, sugar, lead, paint, glass, and paper due to the taxation that England placed on the imports. The sons and Daughters of Liberty encouraged other colonies along the coastline to boycott imports from England also. The organization of patriot men and women spread throughout the colonies from New York down to Georgia. Men and women merchants signed nonimportation agreements on the boycotted items. This created such a hardship on England that the taxes were stopped on everything but the tea.
The American colonies believed that taxation on imports should not exist since the people there were British subjects. The colonies organized a Continental Congress as a form of government to represent them when discussing taxation on imports. England responded by having the British army seize the independent government which leads into the American Revolutionary War. While men workers were drafted to war, women filled empty jobs left by the men. The daughters of liberty helped collect funds to send to the military for clothes and food. The organized efforts of American women were able to provide the soldiers with adequate clothing while the Continental Congress could not. During the Revolutionary War, the daughters of liberty used force to intimidate merchant into not stocking British goods and not helping the British army. Any merchants that were found supporting the British were tarred and feathered.
After the Revolutionary War, the daughters of liberty dissolved as the focus of the American women changed. The new focus of American women was focused on increasing wealth, disappearances of hardships, and the desire to prove that American society is equal to European society. The hard worked and entitlement of equality to men gained by women during the Revolutionary War faded back to a “lady of fashion” (DePauw, 1975).
In the 1800s, it was more acceptable for single women to work and women working with their husbands blessings. In New England, employers sent agents to recruit single women to do the same sewing, spinning, and weaving they did free at home. The women saw this opportunity as a taste of freedom. Men typically had different jobs than the women. However, the work sometimes overlapped and the men always earned more for the same jobs. Women were mostly employed as tailoresses, seamstresses, and shoe binders. Most women in the mills worked 14 to 16 hours a day for a wage of $1.56 a week. More women were brought in the mills to replace men for jobs that women could do at a lower pay. The power looms were introduced to the mills and women were able to run the looms at a lower wage which replaced the worker men.
The Pawtucket Textile Strike of 1824 was the first time women workers strike or (turned out as it was called then) in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. The economy was on a downturn and as a result the mills decided to run an hour longer every day and