New Jobs During Ww2 Essay

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New Jobs for Women and Minorities during World War II During World War II the United States of America (USA) faced a great challenge in fighting a war on two fronts. Not only did they need to draft hundreds of thousands of men to fight the war, but they also needed to increase the number of factories greatly to meet the high demand of resource production needed to support those Soldiers. Due to a shortage of manpower and the need for weapons, ammunition and supplies, World War II provided job opportunities for women and minorities that weren’t available before the war. Women played a pivotal role in meeting the manpower requirements needed to fill manufacturing jobs to support the war effort. For the USA to fill the much-needed factory positions with women, it needed to make some adjustments to its current policies and what was considered socially acceptable. “Many historians have …show more content…
Women would also get exposure to what it meant to be a part of the workforce. “After the war, 22.2 percent of women continued to participate in the workforce compared to the 10.1 percent prior to the war (Goldin, 1991). The increased number of women in the workforce after the war shows that a large number of women wanted to remain in the workforce after holding jobs with steady incomes. Not all women joined the workforce purely for the need to fill those much-needed jobs in the factories. The war also opened up opportunities for women with local economies that were changing or disappearing. “Many young women would join the workforce due to the decline in agricultural households” (Fox-Genovese, 1995). These same economic changes didn’t just apply to women, but also to minorities. Especially African Americans that predominately resided in the

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