European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - December 15, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Labor Force Levels off i working women by Louis a Chloelle new York times  in the United states seem As committed As Ever to holding jobs they Are no longer piling into the labor Force As rapidly As they did in the 1970s and 1980s. The change of Pace which is just beginning to show up in labor department. Data suggests that the number of women working or Job Hunting is being held Down by such developments As the incipient National recession and a rising number of births which Are keeping Many new mothers. Temporarily at Home. Some economists and sociologist contend that american women As a group. Might be approaching the upper limit of a participation in the work Force one imposed by a society that gives women primary responsibility for children be does not furnish adequate child care. Most of these experts agree that the. Ceiling if it indeed exists will Rise again perhaps by the end of the decade if the child care Barrier and other issues Are. Resolved. ,.a a the pattern is changing  increases in labor participation among women have indeed finally levelled off Quot said Thomas Plewes an associate commissioner of the labor department s Bureau of labor statistics. A Quot is this permanent our Best thinking would say that it is not. Women in the labor Force behave More like their fathers than their a . A a the Milder growth rate might have a Silver lining perhaps helping to reverse a 20-year a a trend in which the median incomes of All. A workers have failed to keep up with inflation Quot if women enter the work Force in smaller numbers labor could become a scarcer commodity one that can to be thrown away or under priced so easily Quot said Frank Levy a. University of Maryland labor economist who specializes in income trends. For nearly two years the percentage of allow the nations working age women actually a in the labor Force a that is the women a a holding jobs or actively seeking them a has levelled off at around 57,7 percent the a Bureau of labor statistics reports. A not since the Early 1970s has the Rale Field steady for so Long. By comparison 75 6 percent of working age men Are in the labor Force a. While the participation rate of men. Has been dropping very gradually that of women has climbed sharply since 1960, when it was about 37 percent. Quot a. More significant than the Overall figure the labor participation rates for women in the two largest age groups a 25 to 34 years old and 35 to 44 have risen since 1986 at a much r slower Pace than in the previous 10 years. In the 25-to-34 age group for example the participation rate is 73.1 percent As of. October an increase of Only two percentage a Points since october 1985.a a in contrast the rate jumped 5.6 percentage Points from 1981 through 1985, and 9.8 Points in the late 1970s. A a labor economists and sociologists say. A the recent trends in women a participation in the labor Force have not yet been sufficiently studied to identify precisely the forces at a a a work. A. /. But in More than a dozen interviews and in a review of the data several major themes emerge. A a a a a one is that the slowdown in the . Economy is hitting hardest at industries in. Which women Are heavily represented including service businesses like financial services and retailing. That is a contrast to recessions in the Early 1980s and mid-1970s, which decimated manufacturing with its concentration of Blue a Collar male workers. Quot a a a a. A. Now women losing their jobs might  Home Tor a while rather than  scarce jobs economists say. Young women Are also dragging Down the participation rate especially those below 24. Years of age in the 20-to-24-year-old group. The percentage of women in the labor Market a has actually declined to 71.8 percent last month from a High of nearly 73 percent in = 1985. Vav a a a a a. A rising College enrolment  the absence of these  the labor not some economists and sociologists say that american women As a group might be approaching the upper limit of participation in the work Force. Force. So does Low pay often less than $8 an hour for the less educated. A  frequently make ends meet by living with parents or they enter the labor Force Only sporadically economists say. Young Black women in particular have much lower participation rates than Whit women under 24 v in addition hispanic women of All Ages Many of them first generation immigrants also have much lower participation rates. Than White women Many hispanic women v prefer to be. Homemakers sociologists say the sudden Rise in birth rates might be the most important Factor of  women in their 30s and Early 40s, women who delayed having children while a they established their careers Are now a. Haying children. At the same time married women in their late 20s Are also having children rather than delaying parenthood As their older colleagues often did. A Quot the younger women Are going ahead with motherhood even if it Means giving up the extra income for a while and facing a declining Standard of living Quot said Katherine Newman a Columbia University a a a anthropologist who is studying the phenomenon. A a. A More than 4 million children Weto Boin in a the United states last year and More than 4.1 million births Are Likely this year the census Bureau estimates. Those Are the highest numbers since.1964, the last year in which. Baby  born. A. A and it seems to mean that More american women Are taking time out for childbirth and a. Child rearing. Labor department data Are not Clear on this Point mostly because information Lor. 1989 and 1990 is not yet available Lor the. Crucial age groups involved. \ a. But participation rates for married women of All Ages living with their husbands a group that represents More than 30 in Rillton of the nearly 58 million women in the american labor Force a shed some Light on what . A a fewer than 60 percent of those women a with children under age 6are in the labor a a. Force but three quarters of those witvoider., a children either work or seek work. A i a and the Tabor Force participation Rato of All women a married or not with children a a under 1 year of age which Rose with Groat Speed in the 1980s, has stagnated at 52 percent since 1987. A the reporter Ron Jensen keeping you in touch keeping you informed Ron Jensen was one of the first two reporters from the stars and stripes to set foot on the Sands of saudi Arabia after operation desert shield began. During september Jensen reported on a number of army and air Force units and spent a Day on the aircraft Carrier Independence in the Gulf of Oman. A a a  Jensen a general assignment reporter at the newspaper s main office in Darmstadt Germany has been with the stars and stripes for More than two years. A a. A a a a a a a a during 12 years of newspaper work in the states Jensen worked for dailies in Illinois Kansas and Oklahoma. His writing has won several stateside journalism awards. Jensen hails from Gerlaw Illinois. Neq put a la Inezi to saturday Dac Amber 15, 1990 the stars and stripes k Kir Page 17