3 ms·

If this were true - if needing a good job for a good life predicted going into STEM among women - you'd expect poor women in western countries to flock to STEM

by rntz 9y ago

If this were true - if needing a good job for a good life predicted going into STEM among women - you'd expect poor women in western countries to flock to STEM training as well. Do they?

rimliu 9y ago
Do they flock to ANY kind of education?
- douche 9y ago
  Quite often towards lower-level nursing and other medical tech fields. For instance, you can have a decent paying, stable, career as a CNA, with the potential to progress towards being an RN, with just an associate's degree from a local community college. A significant fraction of the young women I graduated from high school with have gone that route.
hackinthebochs 9y ago
Poor in a western country isn't equivalent to poor in an eastern europe or south asian country. You might expect higher rates, but not on par with what you see from Russia and the like.
usrusr 9y ago
Not if there are enough "more feminine" success models floating around in the public consciousness. Why aim for a Sheldon Cooper career if you can dream of becoming Rachel Green or Carrie Bradshaw? And those are not even pure fantasy: an economy that is far down the service economy road towards what would be better characterized as an ad economy offers quite a few career options far from male-dominated fields that are both "serious" enough to be considered a possible path to success (vs the make-ends-meet-until-marriage spirit of traditional female occupations, think nurse instead of doctor) and still sufficiently down-to-earth to not be considered starlet territory (like the traditional girly pipedream careers of acting, modeling, singing). Why aim for engineer if you can dream of VP for social media outreach? In an economy that is closer to industrial than to service/ad, evading male-dominated fields comes at a much bigger price in career options.

3 ms·

If this were true - if needing a good job for a good life predicted going into STEM among women - you'd expect poor women in western countries to flock to STEM

by rntz 9y ago

If this were true - if needing a good job for a good life predicted going into STEM among women - you'd expect poor women in western countries to flock to STEM training as well. Do they?

rimliu 9y ago
Do they flock to ANY kind of education?
- douche 9y ago
  Quite often towards lower-level nursing and other medical tech fields. For instance, you can have a decent paying, stable, career as a CNA, with the potential to progress towards being an RN, with just an associate's degree from a local community college. A significant fraction of the young women I graduated from high school with have gone that route.
hackinthebochs 9y ago
Poor in a western country isn't equivalent to poor in an eastern europe or south asian country. You might expect higher rates, but not on par with what you see from Russia and the like.
usrusr 9y ago
Not if there are enough "more feminine" success models floating around in the public consciousness. Why aim for a Sheldon Cooper career if you can dream of becoming Rachel Green or Carrie Bradshaw? And those are not even pure fantasy: an economy that is far down the service economy road towards what would be better characterized as an ad economy offers quite a few career options far from male-dominated fields that are both "serious" enough to be considered a possible path to success (vs the make-ends-meet-until-marriage spirit of traditional female occupations, think nurse instead of doctor) and still sufficiently down-to-earth to not be considered starlet territory (like the traditional girly pipedream careers of acting, modeling, singing). Why aim for engineer if you can dream of VP for social media outreach? In an economy that is closer to industrial than to service/ad, evading male-dominated fields comes at a much bigger price in career options.