Gender, Place and the Labour Market

Although research on the labour market has remained central to the development of work on gender in geography, there has been an absence of texts on the importance of space in relation to employment. This volume explores the geography of women's participation in the UK labour market and centres on the importance of work-home interdependencies and factors which both influence women's decision-making processes and contribute to the formation of their perceived societal role. The book draws on interviews with individual women about the influential factors in deciding whether or not they participate in the formal labour market. It highlights the importance of social and cultural factors in addition to the availability of jobs in the local economy in influencing labour market participation. It also compares the choices the Government claims to provide with the choices individual women feel they have when it comes to negotiating their everyday lives.