An interesting New York Times article published earlier this week highlighted a segment of the American workforce that is booming despite the persisting recession.

The Times reports:

The unemployment rate has risen precipitously to 9.4 percent, the highest level in nearly 30 years, and most of the jobs that do come open are quickly filled from the legions of seekers. But unnoticed in the government’s standard employment data, employers are begging for qualified applicants for certain occupations, even in hard times. Most of the jobs involve skills that take years to attain.

Welder is one, employers report. Critical care nurse is another. Electrical lineman is yet another, particularly those skilled in stringing high-voltage wires across the landscape. Special education teachers are in demand. So are geotechnical engineers, trained in geology as well as engineering, a combination sought for oil field work. Respiratory therapists, who help the ill breathe, are not easily found, at least not by the Permanente Medical Group, which employs more than 30,000 health professionals. And with infrastructure spending now on the rise, civil engineers are in demand to supervise the work.

The Times calls upon sociologist Richard Sennett to elaborate on this emerging trend…

For these hard-to-fill jobs, there seems to be a common denominator. Employers are looking for people who have acquired an exacting skill, first through education — often just high school vocational training — and then by honing it on the job. That trajectory, requiring years, is no longer so easy in America, said Richard Sennett, a New York University sociologist.

The pressure to earn a bachelor’s degree draws young people away from occupational training, particularly occupations that do not require college, Mr. Sennett said, and he cited two other factors. Outsourcing interrupts employment before a skill is fully developed, and layoffs undermine dedication to a single occupation. “People are told they can’t get back to work unless they retrain for a new skill,” he said.

Read more.

The Chronicle of Higher Education ran a story today about the proposed elimination of the rural and community sociology program at Washington State University.

The justification for the cuts are as follows:

As colleges and universities struggle through the nation’s economic downturn, most are trying to preserve both academic programs and tenured faculty jobs. When it comes to saving money, universities are laying off staff members, freezing future faculty hiring, imposing furloughs, and trimming operating expenses. Some are merging academic departments, but few are eliminating them outright.

Besides theater and dance, Washington State also wants to get rid of the German major and the department of community and rural sociology. It figures the cuts will save $3.6-million over the next two years. In documents justifying the cuts, officials said professors in theater have too little time for research and that those in community and rural sociology bring in little money for research. Rural sociology has no undergraduate majors, and German awarded only four degrees in 2008. The theater program, administrators said, lacks “visibility and impact.”

But…

The university may have underestimated the outpouring of support for some of the programs it wants to scrap. Scholars have staged a national letter-writing campaign on behalf of the rural-sociology department, and in May students in theater and dance conducted a silent march across the campus to the president’s office.

The Chronicle featured commentary from some Washington State University sociologists:

Annabel R. Kirschner, a full professor in community and rural sociology, is just three years away from her planned retirement. Closing academic programs and laying off tenured faculty, she says, are dramatic steps for a university to take. “I’m concerned it will reflect on the prestige of the university for many years to come,” she says. Besides, Ms. Kirschner believes the action just wasn’t necessary. “If they had done a 10-percent cut across the board,” she says, “there wouldn’t be a need to terminate tenured faculty.” Mr. Bayly [the University Provost], however, says the university already tried that approach, making across-the-board reductions totaling between 2 percent and 5 percent in about 10 of the last 15 years. It wasn’t enough, he says.

José L. García-Pabón has taught in the community and rural sociology department at Washington State for only two years. His position is unique: He is the university’s first Latino community-development specialist. He works with Latino farmers on agriculture and health issues, and on literacy issues with the Latino population in general. Latinos are the fastest-growing minority group in the state. “If I’m gone,” he adds, “I don’t think anyone’s going to continue to do these kinds of things.”

Read more.

Although published earlier this month, the Crawler recently picked up a story about sociologist Liz Cullen’s study of Twitter and how one might define the ‘sociology of Twitter.’

ReadWriteWeb, which posted the story and the video below, reports:

Sociologist and ethnographer, Liz Pullen, spent a month tracking the top 500 Twitter users (as ranked by number of followers) as well as the much-contested suggested users list. In tracking these accounts, she also closely analyzed the behaviors of new adopters and their expectations of the service. Perhaps her conclusions will help us all understand – and hopefully improve – the dismal attrition rates for the service.

View the video…

The Sociology of Twitter, Video Interview with Liz Pullen from ReadWriteWeb on Vimeo.

Read more from ReadWriteWeb.

With a fascinating new article in Gender & Society, the Sociologists for Women in Society issued a press release through EurekAlert, making its way onto the Crawler radar today. The study suggests that pressure to work overtime in the workplace is adversely affecting families – dads are overworked and tired while moms may be more likely to be demoted or fired.

EurekAlert reports,

If dad looks exhausted this Father’s Day it could be due to his job, suggests new research that found many male employees are now pressured to work up to 40 hours of overtime—often unpaid— per week to stay competitive.

Women face the same pressures, but family obligations may force them to work fewer hours on the job, putting them at risk for demotions or even firings.

The new findings, published in the journal Gender & Society, add to the growing body of evidence that heightened competition in the workplace, combined with modern business practices, are resulting in near-unprecedented levels of overtime that may not even be productive in the long run.

“This clearly does not ease the situation for women and men who want to combine career and family-life,” concluded lead author Patricia van Echtelt and colleagues. “Moreover, a growing body of literature shows that working long hours does not automatically lead to greater productivity and effectiveness, and thus not necessarily contributes to employers’ needs but potentially harms the well-being of employees.”

Their conclusions…

Van Echtelt, a Netherlands Institute for Social Research scientist, and her team found that, among the survey respondents, 69 percent of all men worked overtime versus 42 percent of women. Women who work overtime do so at a rate that is about one-third lower than that of their male colleagues.

It’s “usually explained by the continuing trend for women to be more involved in unpaid family work,” the researchers noted. And even when partners share family chores, “men often characterize their contribution as ‘helping’ their wives, without feeling to have the main responsibility.”

The researchers therefore predict families with more kids and at-home responsibilities will become “more constrained in their opportunities to indulge the ‘choice’ to work overtime.”

Choice is turning into expectation at most companies built upon the “team work” model, with pressures coming from project teams, responsibility for meeting profit or production targets, imposed deadlines and employees left to manage their own careers. A separate study at a software engineering firm, for example, determined that interdependent work patterns, “a crisis mentality,” and a reward system based on individual heroics led to “inefficient work processes and long working hours.”

Read more.

This week the press release services are aflutter with stories about parenting, with father’s day just a few days away, but one particular story caught my eye about ‘non-traditional fathers’ authored by a sociologist who interviewed low-income fathers about the meaning of fatherhood – specifically in light of the difficulties faced by these fathers parenting in the absence of a spouse or a father-figure role model in their own lives.

Newswise reports:

This Father’s Day, a Brigham Young University sociologist is focusing on dads that don’t fit the traditional script – dads in the mold of the character played by Will Smith in the film The Pursuit of Happyness (before he earned millions as a stockbroker).

These dads are poor. They’re unmarried. Their own fathers commonly were a lesson in what not to do. Defining fatherhood as they go, these dads shared the meaning they find as self-taught fathers in a study Professor Renata Forste published in a recent issue of the journal Fathering.

“Those who didn’t have a role-model type father, they know what they don’t want to do, but they don’t know what to replace it with,” Forste said.

A clear theme emerged from in-depth interviews with 36 such single dads: Their relationship with their own father determined whether they aimed to succeed, or aimed not to fail. The men who felt close to their fathers tried to “pass the baton” and be a nurturing parent that balances work and family time. One 23-year-old dad in this group had this succinct answer: To make as much money as you can while spending the most time with your kids.

The impact of the absence of positive role models was also noted in the study…

“A lot of them talked about coaches, Scout leaders, and fathers of friends,” Forste said. “They desperately need positive role models and men in their lives. Anybody who works with youth has an opportunity to make a difference.”
Forste also notes the work of Princeton sociologist Sarah McLanahan with a project called Fragile Families. McLanahan’s research finds that attending the birth of their child can be a life-changing moment for young men that may not otherwise embrace fatherhood.

The dads interviewed in the BYU study – selected because they are involved parents – also cast the birth of their children in life-altering terms:

Right away I knew I had a responsibility and it was mine so I wasn’t going to deny it or try to forget about it or anything.

Read more.

Well-known Harvard sociologist William Julius Wilson has come out with a new book entitled, “More Than Just Race: Being Black and Poor in the Inner City,” which recently caught the attention of Minnesota Public Radio. MPR featured the author, in an exchange with Michael Fauntroy, an assistant professor of public policy at George Mason University, about the book and a broader discussion about whether or not poverty among African-Americans in the United States is the result of racism or other external forces…

Listen to the feature.

With the downturn in the economy, there has been significant debate about whether or not Americans’ spending habits have changed for good. An article in the Chicago Tribune explores the debate, with the benefit of some sociological commentary suggesting that the change might not be permanent.

The Tribune reports:

The past decade was one of splurging, as easy access to credit cards and home equity loans enabled Americans to live more lavishly than previous generations. But as the economy has come crashing down, some predict a permanent cultural shift in spending habits. Some anthropologists and economists say more consumers will be like [some Americans] and spend more practically. They’ll buy smaller houses, eat out less and save for big purchases.

Many consumers are being forced into these changes as they watch the value of their homes plummet or find themselves swimming in unmanageable debt. But for others it’s a moral shift as they realize that all that buying doesn’t add much to their lives. “People are at that higher level where they’re saying something is wrong with the way we’re spending and it has got to change,” said Robbie Blinkoff, co-founder and principal anthropologist at Context-Based Research Group. In conjunction with the Carton Donofrio Partners Inc. advertising and marketing firm, it recently surveyed people about the economy’s impact on their spending.

The survey found that a new “grounded” consumer is emerging. These consumers are realizing that life is not defined by what they buy and that credit isn’t a true measure of their financial worth. They’re moving to limit the amount of “stuff” in their lives, the survey found. And they’re learning to live within their means. “The consumer will go through this process of evaluating what stuff they bring into their life to make sure it brings meaning into their life,” Blinkoff said. “They’ll be less superfluous.”

The economist thinks the changes will be permanent…

“It’s going to have to be a new way of life,” he said. Christopher Carroll, a professor of economics at Johns Hopkins University, said more people are realizing that things they once saw as necessities are actually luxuries. Debt is forcing many of the changes.

“What we’ll end up with is an economy where there is more investment, less of a trade deficit and spending is more in line with income,” Carroll said.

But the sociologist thinks otherwise…

Sara Raley, an assistant professor of sociology at McDaniel College in Westminster, Md., with a specialty in consumerism, said shopping is too big a part of people’s lifestyles to be drastically changed. She recently asked her students to name things they couldn’t live without and many listed cell phones, high-speed Internet and multiple televisions.

She also said television, movies and other entertainment media promote luxury living too much.

“I don’t think we’ll see permanent change unless we see some large structural change in the way we idolize consuming,” Raley said. Jean Johnson, an event planner who lives in Suitland, Md., is being a little more cautious with spending but doesn’t plan to abandon her shopping habits anytime soon–especially her shoe habit. The 46-year-old, who shops about once a week, said it’s something she enjoys.

“There are still going to be plenty of people out there who shop,” she said.

Read more.

Yesterday The Examiner ran a story on an article published in the  American Journal of Sociology – and winner of the 2008 Kanter Award Winner for Excellence in Work-Family Research – about the ‘motherhood penalty’:  the pattern demonstrating that working mothers make less than women without children. The study, authored by Shelley J. Correll of Stanford University, Stephen J. Benard, and In Paik also suggests that, “the mommy gap is actually bigger than the gender gap for women under 35.”

About the methods:

188 men and women participated in the study. Researchers used two types of experiments in the study; a laboratory experiment and audit study. The laboratory experiment was used to determine “how evaluators rate applicants in terms of competence, workplace commitment, hireability, promotability and recommended salary.” The audit portion of the experiment measured “positive responses to applicants based on the number of callbacks from actual employers.”

Researchers created fictitious resumes and cover letters and found that the starting salaries were quite different for the women with children versus their counterparts, even though the qualifications in the resumes were equal. The researchers also created fake resumes for both working dads and men without children and found no difference in starting salary for the male gender.

And the findings…

The study found that “Mothers were penalized on a host of measures, including perceived competence and recommended starting salary.” On the other hand, men were not. In fact, according to the study, some working dads actually benefited from being a father.

On average, working mothers were offered $11,000 less pay per year than equally qualified women without children.

According to the report, women without children received 2.1 times as many callbacks as mothers who were equally qualified.

Women without children were recommended for hire 1.8 times more than equally qualified moms, while fathers were recommended for hire and called back at a higher rate.

Read more.

In reporting on President Obama’s nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the United States Supreme Court, the New York Times noted that “President Obama may have broken with history by nominating a Latina to the Supreme Court, but in another respect he followed the path of almost every president in modern times who has successfully placed a justice: he chose a nominee groomed in an Ivy League university.”

In a story titled, “An Ivy-Covered Path to the Supreme Court,” the Times reports:

If confirmed, Judge Sonia Sotomayor, who attended Princeton University and Yale Law School, would sit alongside seven other Ivy League graduates on the court. Only Justice John Paul Stevens provides a measure of non-Ivy diversity, having graduated from the University of Chicago and the Northwestern University School of Law.

In the history of the court, half of the 110 justices were undergraduates, graduate students or law students in the Ivy League; since 1950, the percentage is 70. From the beginning of the 20th century, every president who has seated a justice has picked at least one Ivy graduate. Four of the six justices on President Obama’s short list studied at Ivy League institutions, either as undergraduates or law students.

Whatever a nominee’s origins might be, does attending the same institutions shape them and their views, even subtly? Critics suggest that elite universities shave off the differences in backgrounds and contribute to a kind of high-level groupthink.

A sociologist weighs in…

“There is both a funneling and homogenizing effect from these schools,” said G. William Domhoff, a professor of psychology and sociology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and the author of “Who Rules America?”

The effect, Professor Domhoff said, “plays out in terms of social networks, cultural/social capital, and a feeling of being part of the in-group.” It is one of subtle conditioning — what Sam Rayburn, the former House speaker, meant when he famously said, “If you want to get along, go along.”

Even those who might not agree with Professor Domhoff’s political critique would like to see more educational variety on the Supreme Court. Limiting the universe of nominees largely to Ivy League graduates “is not good for the court or the country,” said Linda L. Addison, the partner in charge of the New York office of Fulbright & Jaworski. “Educational diversity would strengthen the court, as have racial, ethnic, gender and religious diversity.”

And another…

A president who attended a top university might gravitate toward those with a similar education. Stanley Aronowitz, a professor of sociology at the Graduate Center at the City University of New York, said the selection of Judge Sotomayor by a president who graduated from Columbia University and Harvard Law was an example of “people wanting to appoint themselves.”

Professor Aronowitz, who has written extensively on questions of power, higher education and class, jokingly said, “What I think he means by ‘diversity’ is Yale, Harvard, Princeton and Columbia.”

Read more.

The New York Times ran a story over the weekend about how our President and his wife Michelle are able to find time for date night, illustrated in their highly-publicized trip to New York for dinner and a show, and what that means for the rest of us.

The Times reports:

THEIRS is a seasoned marriage, 16 years and counting. They are middle-aged. Life is that modern-crazy haze: two girls in the windstorm of year-end school activities, the puppy that must be walked twice daily, the live-in mother-in-law. They both work long hours. Standard recipe for a drive-by relationship.

At the gala celebrating the crowning achievement of his career, he showed her off to cheering throngs: “How good-looking is my wife?”

And yet… In his lock-step schedule, he sets aside daily “Michelle time.”

And last weekend, he fulfilled a promise to her. They got all gussied up and flew to New York, took a limo to dinner and a Broadway show, then flew home. Date night, just the two of them. Michelle and Barack. And their security detail.

And people’s reactions?

While some commentators were grousing about the presidential date’s undisclosed cost to the taxpayers, news of the romantic evening prompted many wives to glare across the breakfast table, trying to remember the last time their husbands made a fuss over them.

Elbowed sharply in the side, husbands felt betrayed by the commander in chief. On “The Daily Show,” Jon Stewart reviewed the Obamas’ glamorous foray and screeched, “How do you compete with that?” He warned Mr. Obama, “Take it down a notch, dude!”

The Times even has a sociologist weigh in on the event…

But relationship experts are applauding the first couple for giving life to the modern fantasy that longtime spouses can still be passionate about each other. Intentionally or not, the Obamas have become ambassadors for date night, a term that is a creature of these times. A generation ago, when Saturday night rolled around, parents simply went out. Now parents need to be prodded to date each other, as if they’re singles: take a break from the children, already!

“The Obamas really are products of the culture,” said Christine B. Whelan, a sociologist at the University of Iowa who studies the American family. The Obamas exemplify what sociologists call the “individualized marriage,” she added, where a thriving relationship is marked by love and mutual attraction, not just duty to family and social roles.

Read more.