The role of women in economics was perhaps the most significant change in the 1920s. During the First World War women replaced men in the workforce and were able to prove competency equal to men. In earning their own money women gained financial independence that had been unknown to them. After the war women didn’t want to go back and have to rely on their fathers or husbands. Due to the Boom Years the new industries provided employment to both sexes. At the end of the decade there was a 25% increase of women in paid employment (7). By 1930 there were 10546000 women in a variety of jobs and over a million in professions (5). Women began to have more say in not only their consumption but their families’. There is evidence that women’s role in
…show more content…
On the 8th of August 1920 the 19th Amendment became law and women were given equal suffrage (1). Women in every state became equal to men in vote which was a big victory to the feminist movement. Not only that but women started to work in politics. In 1928, there were 145 women in 38 state legislatures, 2 elected to the House of Representatives and 2 were State Governors in succession to their husbands (5). Proof of the changes and influence women had in politics was the Sheppard-Towner Act in 1921 that provided funding for pregnant women’s health care and in which women were given a major role in administration. This was a clear break from the past in that women were given an opportunity to make their voice heard as a participating body of the population as opposed to …show more content…
The ‘flapper phenomenon’ was a movement in which young women rebelled against the inequalities in society and the role they were expected to take of wife and mother, they smoked cigarettes and drank alcohol in public, rode motorbikes, went to nightclubs with men without a chaperone and held their dance partner close (2). The flapper was a ‘new women’, they not only behaved differently but also looked different. They had short ‘bobbed’ hairstyle, wore makeup, short skirts, revealing tops and silk stockings rolled to just above the knee whereas before the 1920s they were expected to have long hair, wear little to no makeup, long dresses with long sleeves and a corset (2). With financial freedom came new freedoms in relations. In 1929 the number of divorces was double what it had been in 1914 (3). This shows women were becoming increasingly independent. A survey in 1920 shows that a mere 31% of the college students had not had premarital sex whereas in 1900 80% of the students hadn’t (2). This was a transformation in that women would not have been able to rebel against societal expectations like this a decade
On the 8th of August 1920 the 19th Amendment became law and women were given equal suffrage (1). Women in every state became equal to men in vote which was a big victory to the feminist movement. Not only that but women started to work in politics. In 1928, there were 145 women in 38 state legislatures, 2 elected to the House of Representatives and 2 were State Governors in succession to their husbands (5). Proof of the changes and influence women had in politics was the Sheppard-Towner Act in 1921 that provided funding for pregnant women’s health care and in which women were given a major role in administration. This was a clear break from the past in that women were given an opportunity to make their voice heard as a participating body of the population as opposed to …show more content…
The ‘flapper phenomenon’ was a movement in which young women rebelled against the inequalities in society and the role they were expected to take of wife and mother, they smoked cigarettes and drank alcohol in public, rode motorbikes, went to nightclubs with men without a chaperone and held their dance partner close (2). The flapper was a ‘new women’, they not only behaved differently but also looked different. They had short ‘bobbed’ hairstyle, wore makeup, short skirts, revealing tops and silk stockings rolled to just above the knee whereas before the 1920s they were expected to have long hair, wear little to no makeup, long dresses with long sleeves and a corset (2). With financial freedom came new freedoms in relations. In 1929 the number of divorces was double what it had been in 1914 (3). This shows women were becoming increasingly independent. A survey in 1920 shows that a mere 31% of the college students had not had premarital sex whereas in 1900 80% of the students hadn’t (2). This was a transformation in that women would not have been able to rebel against societal expectations like this a decade