In this phase, women begin to enter public life and the labour market in increasing numbers for the first time. The welfare state itself becomes the largest employer of women through the newly created possibilities of gainful employment. Not only is the burden on women eased by professional helpers, teachers, doctors, social workers and therapists, but they take up these professions themselves. Above all in northern countries, women begin to become aware of their double status as employees and citizens. It becomes increasingly more apparent that women shoulder the main burden of invisible and unpaid work, which is indispensable to the public welfare system. It also becomes apparent that women, by virtue of their different situation in life, have different time preferences from men; they desire more time, whereas men desire more money; women press for a reduction in the working day, while men tend to prefer a longer annual holiday. They begin to express these preferences and to oppose their interests to those of corporate organizations. As citizens, they demand not just 'time for work', but also 'time for everyday life', for those tasks which they fulfil in multiple ways in their supposedly private time.²4
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Politics of Time