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The Transformation of the American Office: Changes in Employment and Technology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2009

Elyce J. Rotella
Elyce J. Rotella
Affiliation:
Visiting Assistant Professor of Economics, Wellesley College, and Assistant Professor of Economics and Women's Studies, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA 92182
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Abstract

Between 1870 and 1930 production methods in American offices changed substantially as mechanical devices were introduced and work was subdivided and routinized. This paper explores connections between these technological advances and changes in clerical emplyment, particularly the employment of women in offices. A close correspondence is found between the timing of changes in the sex composition of clerical employment and the adoption of new techniques. It is argued that the new technology led to increased hiring of female clerical workers by reducing the form-specific skill requirements for clerical jobs.

Type
Papers Presented at the Fortieth Annual Meeting of the Economic History Association
Information
The Journal of Economic History , Volume 41 , Issue 1 , March 1981 , pp. 51 - 57
Copyright
Copyright © The Economic History Association 1981

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References

1 For a more complete treatment of the history of the U.S. clerical labor force see Rotella, Elyce J., From Home to Office: U.S. Women at Work, 1870–1930 (forthcoming, 1981).Google Scholar

2 See for examples Oppenheimer, Valerie K., The Female Labor Force in the United States (Berkeley, CA, 1970), pp. 64–120;Google ScholarGross, Edward, “Plus ça change …” Social Problems, 16 (Fall 1968);Google ScholarEconomic Report of the President, 1973 (Wahington, D. C., 1973), pp. 89–112.Google Scholar

3 For a discussion of the many other factors contributing to the change in the sex composition of clerical employment, see Rotella, From Home to Office.Google Scholar

4 Much of the description of the early office is summarized from Lockwood, David, The Black-Coated Worker (London, 1958).Google Scholar

5 Houlston's Industrial Library, no. 7, The Clerk: A Sketch and Outline of His Duties and Discipline (London, 1878).Google Scholar

6 Current, Richard N., The Typewriter and the Men Who Made It (Urbana, IL, 1954), p. 68.Google Scholar

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11 For discussion of the theoretical and empirical issues involved in this argument, see Rotella, From Home to Office.Google Scholar

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19 For examples, see Women's Educational and Industrial Union of Boston, The Public Schools and Women in Office Service (Boston, 1914), p. 78;Google ScholarNational Industrial Conference Board, Clerical Salaries in the United States (New York, 1926), p. 11.Google Scholar

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