Gendered States: Women, Unemployment Insurance, and the Political Economy of the Welfare State in Canada, 1945–1997

Margaret Conrad is Canada Research Chair in Atlantic Canada Studies at
the University of New Brunswick. She is the author of Atlantic Canada: A
Region in the Making, and co-author of Intimate Relations: Family and
Community in Planter Nova Scotia, 1759–

By taking a historical approach and employing a gender lens, Ann Porter
makes a major contribution to our understanding of one of Canada’s
most hotly contested social programs. Unemployment insurance, introduced
in 1940, was initially predicated on a male family breadwinner. Women
often received lower rates than men, while married women, perceived as
dependants, were sometimes disqualified from receiving any unemployment
benefits at all. Although this double standard with regard to
entitlement was challenged at the outset, it was modified only when
women entered the paid labour force in increasing numbers in the 1960s
and protests mounted from women’s and labour groups. The 1971
legislation, Porter argues, offered unprecedented income security for
the unemployed, and extended benefits to such groups as hospital
workers, teachers, and government employees, among whom women figured
prominently. In addition, maternity benefits and shorter eligibility
requirements worked in favour of women, whose relationship to the labour
force often differed from that of men.

The conditions that made the 1971 legislation possible—low
unemployment levels, minimal state intervention to ensure employability,
and a consensus around the desirability of social security—soon
disappeared. By the end of the 1970s the economy was in crisis and the
neoliberal assault on the workplace and the welfare state well under
way. The UI program was one of the first to be fingered for
restructuring, and both Liberal and Progressive Conservative
administrations worked to reduce its reach. With Paul Martin’s 1995
reforms, even the terminology changed. “Employment insurance,” as it
was now called, was harder to get, especially for part-time workers, the
majority of whom were women. The figures tell the story. Between 1989
and 1997, the percentage of the unemployed receiving benefits dropped
from 83.4 percent to 41 percent. For women the proportion dropped from
81.7 percent to 39 percent.

This is an academic monograph, but the general reader interested in the
topic will find it accessible—carefully organized, clearly written,
and filled with fascinating details.