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But even after WW2 women were expected to go back to being the little wife at home. When they objected to this after their experiences working in factories and elsewhere, they were treated as hysterical ninnies and given medication.
When I first started work in the 1960s, women were expected to leave work when they got married. The (male of course) bosses found that they were losing their good and experienced secretaries, so their solution was ... no, not to keep them on the payroll as before, but to employ them as casuals, so they had no membership of the superannuation fund, no paid holidays, etc.
Equal pay came in in the 1970s and I remember it well as it made a big difference to my income - it made the difference between just scraping by and having a bit of extra money for more than the bare necessities.
But of course in the 19th century there were plenty of working women, and the work they and the men of the "working classes" had to do was pretty back-breaking and soul-destroying. But at least they were able to get on with their lives, such as they were, rather than finding themselves an eligible bachelor to keep them in the manner to which they would like to be accustomed.
The women are hunting for husbands while the men are hunting the foxes.
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