bank teller was leading to further occupational segregation" (Strachan, 6).
Not surprisingly, this high level of segregation in the Australian labor market fomented wage discrimination. Through the 1970s, Australian employers gave men "family wages," which were engineered to ensure that the worker could maintain a family of five (man, woman, and three children) at a comfortable level. Women in the labor market, on the other hand, were judged to not have responsibility for dependents and received wages that were roughly half the standard level given to males in the labor force. This phenomenon had the effect of entrenching lower wage rates for women in Australian society. The massive disruptions in the labor market which were engendered by World War II began the long process of wage equalization between the sexes. In the decades following the war, women's wages rose to about 75 percent of the average male wage rateùstill far from equal (Stracham, 6-7).
Because occupations in Australia continue to be segregated by gender, differences in wage rates between men and women continue to plague the country. As recently as 1998, women were denied equal pay in several job-classifications at HPM Industries because the Commissioner ruled that the appropriate methodology for evaluating equal value as to apply the criteria or work value (Stracham, 7-8).
Table 1 shows the relation between men and women in the Australian workforce. The key statistics which highlight the continuing segregation of the Australian workforce are the adju
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