Workplace Flexibility: Realigning 20th-Century Jobs for a 21st-Century Workforce

The nursery rhyme might still go something like "This little parent goes to work, and this little parent stays home," but the reality is very different now, with the rise of dual-earner households, single parent/earner households, and older couples facing joint retirement. Sociologists, anthropologists, economists, employment lawyers, and others explore 21st-century workers and family life, the misfit between old workplaces and a new workforce, voluntary employer practices of workplace flexibility in the US, and workplace flexibility practices from abroad. Among specific topics are multitasking among working families as a strategy for dealing with the time squeeze, working families coming together at dinner, keeping engaged parents on the road to success, elderly labor supply, employers who permit work hour reductions for childcare, US family-hostile public policy, parents' experiences of flexible work arrangements in changing European workplaces, and flexible employment and the introduction of work-life balance programs in Japan. Annotation c2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)