TABLES 23 to 25 list the occupations in which women and men are employed (TABLE 23), the occupations in which part-time work is most prevalent (TABLE 24), and the distribution of unemployment across occupations (TABLE 25).

Note from these TABLES that:

• Women continued to be as concentrated in relatively few occupations in 1985 as they were in 1975 (e.g., in 1975 and in 1985, 72% of employed women were concentrated in just three occupational categories: Professional/artistic [mainly the teaching and health professions], Clerical, and Service). In contrast, men are distributed more evenly across all occupations.
  
  
• Part-time work has grown in all areas which employ substantial numbers of women. A total of 44% of the women employed in Service occupations and 40% of women in Sales are part-time workers. These are, of course, the occupational sectors which employ the highest concentration of part-time workers.
  
  
• Unemployment among women has increased in all occupations. In 1985, the highest rates of unemployment for women were in three occupational categories:
  
  - Service
  
  - Primary Industry
  
  - Secondary Industry.

Unemployment in Primary and Secondary industries is likely the result of a general slowing in these sectors (noted earlier), since unemployment is high among men in these areas as well.

• . While Service, Sales, and Clerical areas have seen some growth over the Decade, the high unemployment in the Service sector and, to a lesser extent, in the Sales and Clerical areas, are apparently the result of an even larger influx of women into these areas.

These findings bring into question the belief that if women were distributed across all occupations, their rate of unemployment would be reduced.

TABLES 23-25 suggest that if such distribution occurred, it may simply move women from unemployment in the Service sector to unemployment within Primary and Secondary Industries.

In summary, the TABLES reveal the existence of two problems overlaid on one another:

1. Unemployment is high and is expected to increase. especially in unskilled jobs (Service, Primary and Secondary Industries).
   
   
2. Less well-educated women (like all women) are segregated into narrow occupational areas within these shrinking areas of opportunity.

As has been noted for many years by futurists*, it is not clear that there will be work for everyone in the future. In order to cope with this trend toward higher rates of unemployment, large-scale re-structuring of the economy (which has not yet begun) is essential. Without this, serious economic hardship lies ahead for both women and men.

* And most recently by Armstrong, P. Labor Pains. 1985.